Dr. Chuck Tryon

December 15, 2014

An elective within the new Ethics and Civic Engagement core requirementCourse objectives include the expectation that students will think critically about ethics of documentary films Students are taught to view documentaries as “rhetorical” texts◦ Bill Nichols’ formula: “I am speaking about them to

you.”◦ Documentaries use evidence to persuade viewers to

act or to believe◦ Filmmakers must also treat subjects ethically

Students were required to watch one documentary per week and read articles on documentary ethicsScreenings were supplemented with contemporary news accounts or movie reviewsStudents attended library instruction with Ms. Putnam and were encouraged to use library databasesTheir major paper was a paper assessing the ethics of a documentary of their choice

Determine the extent of information needed◦ Make judgments about how documentaries compared to the

historical record

Access the needed information effectively and efficiently◦ Introduced to Academic Search Complete and Lexis-Nexus

databases

Evaluate information and its sources critically◦ Make determinations about whether sources are reliable, what

biases might inform their sources, etc.

Use information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose◦ Importance of engaging with arguments about a specific issue or

historical event

Understand the economic, legal, and social issues regarding the use of information◦ Complicated issue—Issues of Fair Use in documentary production

often differ from plagiarism and other citation issues.

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Pre-Test Results - 2/25/2014

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Post-Test Results - 4/24/2014

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Results improved for Question #4 (Boolean operators) from 23% correct to 57% correct.100% of students answered 4 questions correctly (Question #7 – A scholarly journal has all these characteristics; Question #15 – When using the Internet at an information source, it is important to remember ..who is the author or “authority” responsible for the information of the website; Question #19- what is the Best way for you to get help with your research …Ask the librarian for help; and, #20 – Information you find on the Internet…comes from many varied sources). 14% of students answered all 20 post-test questions correctly; pre-information literacy and BI 0 students had a perfect score.

There was a negative correlation between high test results and information literacy ability self-assessment.◦ Students who scored best were often less confident

than those who fared poorly on the test

Students performed worse on question 17, which focused on citation requirements for web sources.◦ Possible explanation: misunderstanding of the

concept of fair use (use of Creative Commons) for documentary filmmaking versus appropriate scholarly practices.

Completed after BI

Students were required to do annotations for five sources

Sources had to include a variety of formats (scholarly, non-scholarly, etc).

Best outcome: student found original 1989 news article that spawned Capturing the Friedmans court case.

Source: Capturing the Friedmans, dir. Andrew

Jarecki. HBO, 2004. DVD.

Students assessed filmmaker’s ethics both toward his/her subjects and the audienceResearch focused on comparing news articles with documentary (Lexis-Nexus)Some discussion of “effects” of documentary on its audiencesOther research focused on identifying scholarly research on documentary ethics (Academic Search Complete)Other films: Sicko, Blackfish, An Inconvenient Truth, Act of Killing, Food Inc.

Super Size Me, dir. Morgan Spurlock. Paramount, 2004. DVD.

Significant improvement in post-test results; students also contacted Ms. Putnam for further library instruction

Students found pertinent news articles about their topics

Students used reputable scholarly sources on documentary ethics and on their individual films◦ Pat Aufderheide’s Documentary: A Short Introduction

◦ Bill Nichols’ Introduction to Documentary

◦ Two students found sources that I plan to use in future versions of the course!

Confusion about citing websites

Misunderstanding of how Boolean Operators work

Lack of time for feedback on annotated bibliographies due to inclement weather

Need for better instruction on thinking critically about “conspiracy” documentaries based on unreliable evidence◦ TWA 600, Loose Change, etc.

Developing information literacy skills is an on-going process◦ Although most of my students had taken English

120, they initially struggled with finding sources

Students used multiple databases to find a variety of sources, suggesting that BI was incredibly helpful

More supplemental instruction—treating research as a process—would have been helpful.