Write@UGA Keynote Address

Title: Attention is the Scarcity: New Approaches to Information Literacy

Abstract: Using a variety of examples showing the challenges of navigating our current information environment, digital literacy expert Mike Caulfield will show how and why traditional approaches to critical thinking instruction often fail to prepare our students for the world they encounter online. Questions considered will be the role of attention and emotion in making sense of information, why "checklist" approaches tend to make students less effective at judging source quality, and the disconnect between academic approaches and the external information environment. Results from a number of large educational interventions will be presented.

Speaker: Mike Caulfield is currently a research scientist leading the UW Center for an Informed Public's rapid response efforts around election misinformation. He has worked with various organizations on digital literacy initiatives to combat mis- and disinformation, including the American Association of State Colleges and Universities’ American Democracy Project, the National Writing Project, and CIVIX Canada. The creator of the SIFT method for evaluating the reputation of claims and sources, he is an awardee of the Rita Allen/RTI Misinformation Solutions Prize and the author of an award-winning open textbook, “Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers.”

Handle: @holden on twitter, blog: hapgood.us

Registration Link: https://ugeorgia.ca1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cZI