Information Practices

The other day at the reference desk a student told me that she was an economics major, but was taking a history class. She needed to write a literature review for a paper she was to turn in later in the semester. She recognized that she could easily write a literature review for an economics paper, but wasn't sure how to do this for a history paper. She thought, based on her involvement in the class, that it would be quite different. She asked me if I could direct her to resources that would explain to her how to write a literature review in history.

A librarian colleague of mine marveled at the student's awareness of the different approaches in disciplinary discourse conventions. I just thought how empowering it is to begin to understand the rules (conventions) of a discourse. I mean, what would be the outcome of writing your history paper like an economics paper. Yet, I understand from my conversations with professors, that many of them assume that the discourse conventions of their discipline is standard and common to all. Students often learn the more specific conventions in a situated way,e.g., learning how to write history by being criticized when you haven't written it right.

This is a good place to begin. The question is, What kind teaching best allows learners to understand disciplinary conventions and best be able to engage with disciplinary information practices?