Thinking Outside the Book: Diverse Approaches to Teaching, Training, and Learning

The conference was held Friday, March 13, 2015 at The William and Ida Friday Center for Continuing Education in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Dr. Greene’s keynote address is now available online.

View the conference schedule and session descriptions.

The conference included presentations on how librarians, archivists and information professionals are exploring new models to support and inform library staff and users’ work.

Digital Petting Zoo

Attendees learned about and experimented with mobile research and productivity applications at the Digital Petting Zoo during a portion of the lunch break. If you would like to download any of the apps to your own device, these links are available:

Keynote: Fostering Digital Literacy in the 21st Century

Dr. Jeffrey A. Greene, Associate Professor in the Learning Sciences and Psychological Studies program at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

What are the strengths and needs of today’s learners, and in what ways, if any, do these “digital natives” differ from previous generations? How can librarians foster students’ ability to learn, and best position students for success in both face-to-face and online environments? The answers to these questions are critical to understanding digital literacy, a set of knowledge and skills that students need to be successful 21st century learners. In this keynote address, Jeffrey Alan Greene will discuss the new science of learning, and how it informs our understanding of students, how to reach them, and what they need to know and be able to do. He will show that while there is little new under the sun, the keys to unlocking the enormous potential of today’s learners, and the tools they use, are often little-known, and sometimes counter to common knowledge.

Dr. Jeffrey A. Greene is an Associate Professor in the Learning Sciences and Psychological Studies program at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has focused his research on student digital learning and literacy, and in particular, the ways in which students’ cognition, metacognition, and beliefs interact to affect their acquisition of conceptual understanding in science and history. He has published numerous articles and book chapters on digital learning and literacy, and his work has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Institute for Education Sciences, and the Spencer Foundation. He serves as Associate Editor of Metacognition and Learning and is an editorial board member of several top-tier journals including the Journal of Educational Psychology, Educational Psychologist, Science Education, and Contemporary Educational Psychology. Dr. Greene holds a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Maryland, as well as a Master’s degree in Measurement, Statistics, and Evaluation.