Welcome to the Library!
The
following steps outline a simple and
effective strategy for finding information
for a research paper and documenting the
sources you find.
· Identify
and develop your topic
· Write about what you know
· Write about what you want to know
· Write about what you care about
Generate Ideas
One way to generate some
ideas is by asking questions like:
Who? When? What? Where? Why? How?
Find Background Information
Spend some time in the
library doing background reading on your
topic. Consult encyclopedias, journal and
newspaper articles. Try the online
Encyclopedia Britannica. Go to
http://school.eb.com
Ask the librarian for the
usernames and passwords
Develop a thesis.
Once you have an overall
picture of the subject in your mind, select
a particular aspect to concentrate on.
Plan ahead!
Use the Catalog to Find Books
Connect to the library
catalog. Use keyword searching for a search
topic. Use subject searching for a broad
search. When you pull the book from the
shelf, scan the bibliography for additional
sources. Use the
resources at your town library.
Use Indexes such as
EBSCOHOST or the Student Resource Center.
In order to locate journal
articles, students search online databases
and indexes. Some databases offer full-text
articles, others just bibliographic
information, including the citation and
abstract. Go to
http://search.epnet.com/login.asp
Click on “All Ebsco Resources
from NHewLink button.” To use a particular
database it is necessary to check off the
ones of interest. Try the “Academic Search
Elite.” Other databases include Business
Source Elite, Eric, Health Source, Newspaper
Source or Novelist. Click on the “Advanced
Search” tab at the top. You have fields to
search in- make sure you choose whether you
want the term you are using to be in the
article’s title (TI), the author of the
article (AU), the subject (SU)or anywhere in
the text of the article(TX). Make sure
you click on “Full Text,” if you want to
only retrieve entire articles, not just
summaries of the articles. You may want to
choose “Peer Reviewed” also to limit your
search to professional journals, rather than
popular magazines or other sources.
The Student Resource
Center is also an excellent place to
start research. Go to
http://infotrac.galegroup.com/itweb/raym13330.
Ask the Librarian for the passwords. The
database has
access to electronic reference material and
to full text magazine and journal articles.
Try
Find Articles for free access to
over 300 full text journals.
The World Wide Web is another resource you
may find helpful. When using web sites be
careful to evaluate the web site for
accuracy, bias, currency and completeness.
Other databases include:
For online help with
MLA Documentation
visit
http://mciu.org/%7Espjvweb/mla.html or
http://www.easybib.com
Try the
Noodle Tools for MLA examples.
The address students need to use is
http://www.noodletools.com/quickcite
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