Informationssökning som diskursiv och social praktik i de yngsta skolbarnens rum för lärande [Information Seeking as a Discursive and Social Practice in the Youngest Schoolchildren's Rooms for Learning]

Abstract

The aim of the study reported in this article is to investigate what meanings are assigned to information seeking and ICT as tools for learning during the early school years. The study is framed within a sociocultural perspective of learning. Data were collected through focus groups with teachers and librarians, and through field studies in five classes and two school libraries. The findings indicate dichotomies in how teachers and librarians ascribe meaning to ICT as tools for learning, such as control vs. lack of control over information, and childhood (play and imagination) vs. adulthood (technology). In the discursive and social practices of the school and the library, books prevail as tools for reading and information seeking. Our conclusion is that ICT tools seem to threaten the professional identity of elementary school teachers and librarians, since their traditional overall task has been to teach reading by using their professional knowledge of children’s literature.