This interactive workshop will highlight practices for reinventing information literacy instruction as a way to connect students with the information they need in their real lives. We will use prompts and activities to discuss the ways academic culture intentionally and unintentionally discredits non-academic information. By examining opportunities for realigning library instruction, we aim to empower learners to utilize information for the purpose of creating authentic connections to place, to others, and within themselves. We will also invite reflection on how to create and support teaching practices that encourage ways of finding and sharing knowledge sourced/created outside of academia (such as traditional and local knowledge, and dynamic community information) and expanding our beliefs about the role of justice in teaching information literacy. Following the model of environmental educators David Orr and Robin Kimmerer, we will also encourage a discussion of the questions: What is library instruction for? What should library instruction be?
