School of Information Sciences

Koh group presents youth maker learning research at summit

Kyungwon Koh
Kyungwon Koh, Associate Professor and Director of the Champaign-Urbana (CU) Community Fab Lab

PhD student Lo Lee will present work from Associate Professor Kyungwon Koh's research group at the Connected Learning Summit 2019, which will be held October 2-5 at the University of California, Irvine. The mission of the summit is to "fuel a growing movement of innovators harnessing emerging technology to expand access to participatory, playful, and creative learning." The program includes presentations and workshops ranging from speculative design, to game walkthroughs, sharing work in progress, and research panels.

Lee will present the paper, "Fostering Information Literacy through Autonomy and Guidance in the Inquiry and Maker Learning Environments," which she coauthored with Koh and researchers and practitioners from the University of Oklahoma and Norman Public Schools. Their study investigated high school students' information practices and educators' guidance in inquiry-based maker learning environments. The researchers found that students in that learning environment benefit from guidance that is flexible and not too restrictive. The ongoing research investigates the "optimal environments for learners to exercise autonomy over their information practices and learning while feeling supported and guided."

Lee is a third-year PhD student who is interested in human information behavior, especially information behavior of creative people such as crafts hobbyists. She is also interested in the maker movement and how it influences library and museum programs. Lee earned her MS in library and information science from Illinois and BA in foreign languages in literature from National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan.

Koh's areas of expertise include digital youth, the maker movement, learning and community engagement through libraries, human information behavior, and competencies for information professionals. Koh earned her MS and PhD in library and information studies from Florida State University and BS in library and information science from Yonsei University in South Korea.

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