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Increasingly, schools are embracing action research as an innovative strategy to develop collective teacher efficacy and expertise in a bid to improve learner outcomes. In this chapter, what follows is an exploration of the challenges frequently faced by middle leaders implementing and facilitating action research in schools. These include low levels of collective autonomy, clouded evaluative thinking, and the siloing of success. To support middle leaders in overcoming these challenges, Sarah and Pamela offer an array of practical solutions they have witnessed working successfully in varying contexts. In doing so, they spotlight the work of educational thought leaders, Michael Fullan, Professor Emeritus Helen Timperley, Dr Kaye Twyford, and Simon Breakspear.

This paper aims to report on the evaluation of a curriculum development project that took place in the Department of Psychology at the University of Sheffield. The project, funded by a Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CILASS), sought to embed information literacy development in a Level One module using an inquiry‐based learning pedagogical approach. Students worked collaboratively to find news stories that were purportedly based on real psychological research and then searched for the related research paper. They reflected on this task and the differences between the two sources as part of the assessed work for the module.

The paper synthesizes the results of a number of evaluation instruments (questionnaire, information literacy competency test, focus group, student reflective work) to examine staff and student perceptions of the inquiry task, and how effective the task was in building students' information literacy. A “Theory of Change” evaluation methodology was used to define the scope of evaluation activities.

The SCONUL Seven Pillars of Information Literacy model is used to structure the findings from the various evaluation methods. Students developed their knowledge of, and ability to search, appropriate academic resources, although they demonstrated a preference for searching via Google Scholar over Web of Knowledge.

Students demonstrated through their reflective comments that they had developed significant abilities to compare and evaluate news stories and journal articles, although they reported a lack of confidence in these abilities. Postgraduate tutors thought the inquiry task was successful in developing students' information literacy and both students and staff responded positively to the ability to choose topics of interest to investigate.

The purpose of this paper is to mitigate the dearth in the library literature of large‐class, active learning pedagogies, by providing examples of these instructional approaches used in mega‐classes within the science, humanities, and education fields, for application within the library environment, specifically in large information literacy instruction sessions.

The author surveys both the library and science and education literatures, comparing coverage of active learning approaches in the professional literatures of each.

Although the library literature enthusiastically supports active learning approaches to teaching information literacy in theory, there are statistically few librarians who employ these learning modalities in their teaching. There are hardly any examples in the library literature of librarians using large‐class, active‐learning pedagogies. This article discusses some of the reasons behind librarians' reluctance to use active learning techniques and offers pragmatic suggestions from the literature of the sciences and education to alleviate this reticence.

This paper helps fill in the gap in the library literature discussing large‐class, active pedagogies for information literacy instruction. It offers some practical solutions from within the non‐library literature to some of the pedagogical obstacles inherent in mass classes, making explicit applications to information literacy instruction.