Reference, Mental Models and Teaching Technology

Summary

It would be easy to say that technology is complicating things for reference, but things are more complicated than that. Technology should be a system for solving problems, but for many people, both librarians and users, it is the problem. But in some ways it hides an even older problem-understanding things from the user's point-of-view. Contemporary cognitive and educational theories note that we are not paying enough attention to the user/learner, that we do not understand the mental models of those who use libraries, library systems and reference. As more technology is used and complicates systems for users, we should focus more on what users bring to the reference/learning interaction.

Key Words:

• Reference
• learning
• mental model
• teaching
• analogies
• system model
• constructivism
• Internet
• technology