Professionals: Judy Pitts

Judy Pitts, former assistant professor in school media at Emporia State University, editor of  School Library Media Quarterly, and school media specialist (Deceased).

There are many process-based models of information inquiry and instruction. In Britain, the work of Ann Irving and Michael Marland is influential. In the United States, the models have been influenced by research writings of Carol Kuhlthau, Barbara Stripling, and Judy Pitts. Their influence is reflected in the models of library instruction developed in Australia and Alberta, Canada.

Judy M. Pitts’ extensive research on the cognitive aspects of student research concludes that media specialists need to base instruction on the ways students learn, integrating research with the curriculum. An important feature of the model is that the authors believe instruction should be based on how students learn best and have concluded that more new learning occurs when connected to previous learning, a precept of constructivist learning theory.

Winner of the AASL / Highsmith Reseach Grant for:
Intuitive Understanding and Mental Models of Information: A Qualitative Study of Factors Associated with the Information Seeking and Use Behavior of Adolescents, 1993.

• Stripling and Pitts Research Process Model from eduScapes:
  http://eduscapes.com/info/pitts.html
• Pre-search Process from eduScapes http://eduscapes.com/info/presearch.html
  Note that viewing of video requires password: video

Selected Book:
Stripling, Barbara & Pitts, Judy. Brainstorms and Blueprints: Teaching Research as a Thinking Process. Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 1998.
IASL Review Online: http://www.iasl-slo.org/review58.html