Lesson 10 - Wrap Up

I have had an ideal situation while taking this class.  I had my students doing lessons at the same time I was reviewing what I had learned some years ago.  I often find I forget resources unless I repeatedly use them myself.  It was great to repeat this class to review what I had forgotten.  Reviewing while the younger classes were  learning how to use the World Book, Proquest and other electronic resources could not have been better timing.  I would still like to introduce Ancestry to one class as they did some research into family history. 

My goals are the following: 
#1  That Dakota Christian School students use  the electronic resources offered by the state library as our primary sources for research.   I find that it takes constant reminders to the staff  and students that these resources are available.  One staff member did comment that next year she would demand one resource be from the electronic resources that are offered by the state library.  This year I used library time during our reading contest to introduce and review the electronic resources.  It  worked very well since the students had the books they had to read.  No time was needed for check out.

#2 To continue to have the students learn and review the resources available.  I have made work sheets and I hope to evaluate them and make new work sheets to use next year.

I also have a game I would like to do on the last week of school.  We have one set of World Book Encyclopedias in our library.  I am thinking of having one group of students look up a fact in the hard cover set and the other group of students use the World Book online and see who finds the information first.  I have to give this some thought on how to do it.  One of my goals is that the students do realize what an old World Book Encyclopedia was like so they can see the difference. 

I was encouraged last week.  Two fifth grade students, who are cousins and live on the same farm, asked if our library had information on goats since they had new goats on their farm.  We found one book and then I suggested the World Book Encyclopedia online.  Each student wanted an article printed to take home with them.  They knew exactly how to get to the World Book Resource without me helping them. 

Thanks for this Challenge.  I hope to refer back to this class in the future.  I appreciated all your hard work in preparing the lessons!

Lesson 9 -- History and Genealogy Resources—Ancestry Library, Heritage Quest and Sanborn Maps

Lesson 9 -- History and Genealogy Resources—Ancestry Library, Heritage Quest and Sanborn Maps

#1 The Titanic and her sister ship

I took some time to look at this site. In Passenger Ships I typed in Titanic and at the very end of the article I read the name of the sister ship, Olympic. Then I read about the Olympic. It was interesting that after the destruction of the Titanic, they did do some altering of the Olympic which was built as the same time as the Titanic.

#2 This part of the assignment was a bit frustrating. I finally did an advance search and found a large number of results but I accidently left my notes at school and can’t remember the number. However, most of them were obituaries and I think I would need to ask more questions about what the student wanted.

#3. County anniversary and historical information.  

This was a frustrating assignment and since I had to do it at school, I did not spend as much time as I would like. I used Persi and then went to Places. I typed in South Dakota and my county Charles Mix County. Twenty nine articles appear but I am not able to read the articles. Am I doing something wrong? I imagined very concrete information and I tried using the request form and order form but that is not helpful either. I need to spend more time on this.  I should try to understand this site a bit more.

Extra things

I did some personal searching of information in the Ancestry resource. I found several of my grandparents' names. Then I searched my own name. The search was interesting! There are many people with my last name! Maybe it is good that I can only do this at school. I love family history and have traced my husband’s family back to the 1600’s years ago when doing it was free online!

 

 

Lesson 8--ArchiveGrid and CAMIO

Lesson 8--ArchiveGrid and CAMIO

1. Using ArchiveGrid I typed in Nobel Prize Theodore Schultz and the first entry came up with Papers 1933-1988 which are at the Parks Library at Iowa State University.  This entry also gave a description of Schultz and discussed the oleo margarine controversy in 1943 that resulted in the resignation of Schultz from the Department of Economics and Sociology.  I discovered that you could click on other items that brought you to World Cat with the same entry, Papers, 1933-1988. 

2. Using CAMIO  Clothing during the Victorian Era and Charles Dickens

After a bit of frustration I finally typed in dress and the year 1850.  There were 11 results and I did spend some time looking at the pictures of dresses.  Are there any pictures of men’s clothing?  I also typed in clothing (17 results) and fashion (16 results).  For each of these I clicked on 1800.  I tried typing Victorian Era but nothing would come up.  I liked the way you could focus on parts of the outfits if you wanted to look at the details quite close.  This might prove valuable if a school did a play of a certain era.

Lesson 7 -- WorldCat and More FirstSearch Indexes

I have learned quite a few things in my research with the World Cat.

#1 Martin Luther books

When I first looked up Martin Luther I kept getting Martin Luther King items. I tried quotation marks around the words Martin Luther but that did not help. I knew I had to advance my search so since I knew Luther was part of the Reformation I added that to the search. From this point on I also limited my search to books. I found ten titles. I looked up two of these titles but from the pictures of the books and the locations being Northern State College and Augustana College I began to realize that the two books and the rest of the list were probably too advanced for 4^thand 5^th grade reading level. I went back to the search and clicked on juvenile. Again a list of 10 books! I was so glad to see the pictures of the covers. I found one book Spy for theNight Riders that might be good for this age level. It was available at Sioux land Libraries. I saw another book, Martin Luther by Fosdick that is available at the Mitchell Public Library and the last book, Martin Luther, a Man who Changed the World only had 26 pages and was described as a biography. For a Sunday school class it might be a good book to use pictures along with some of the biographical information that is in the book. The book was available at the Brookings Public Library. I would recommend the last two books because if the Sunday School teacher would call either of those libraries and ask for the books she should be able to get them within a week and the age level seemed appropriate.

Out of curiosity I went online to check my own Dakota Christian School Library. We have five books in our elementary library and three books in our high school library about Martin Luther. I would gladly lend these to the Sunday School teacher.

#2 Graphic Novels

I did a search and started out with graphic novels and then advanced the search by adding the word classics. 775 items resulted in the search.

Our school library does not have graphic novels. I am really considering this. I found three classic graphic novels that looked appealing to me. Kidnappedpublished by Hauppauge, Tom Sawyer published by Sterling, and Mark Twain by Eureka Productions. My question would be if it is better to get a series from one publisher or do a variety of selections from different publishers.

#3 Vocal score of My Fair Lady

I typed in My Fair Lady and also designated title phrase in the search. Then I clicked on the section of type and clicked on musical score. There were 274 results in English. I clicked on the third entry but then looked and found a better selection, (Number 6) that was entitled “My Fair Lady, Vocal Selection”however, there were no copies available at any of the SD Libraries. So I checked out more of the entries and finally went back to the third entry when I was sure that it had vocal scores included. This selection is available at Northern State University and University of South Dakota. The accession number is 26429906.

A little knowledge of music is valuable when you look at the descriptions to make sure you are getting vocal scores or just piano music.

Lesson 6 -- EBooks on EbscoHost (formerly NetLibrary)

I decided to do a search on South Dakota.  I narrowed the search to South Dakota History and found 5 results.  I looked at the book,  Bachelor Bess The Homesteading Letters.  My great grandparents moved to South Dakota in the late 1890’s.  I think this book and others that I see would help me realize what life was like during that time.  Another book is After the West was Won by Paula Nelson which describes a period in South Dakota from 1900-1917.  As I reviewed my researching I realized that topic of South Dakota can be broken down into different categories and the categories can also be broken down.

I did a search for fairy tales.  There was a list of the following books with colors:  The Violet Fairy Book, The Blue Fairy Book, The Blue Book, The Yellow Fairy Book and the Red Fairy Book.  Each of these were written by Andrew Lang.  It was great to see the actual cover of the book and the colors. It appears you could find quite a few old fairy tales to read in these books!  No wonder the grandmother described in the search could recall these books. 

The only negative thing about the EBooks is that I find I have to zoom in on the pages and make the print bigger.  If I don’t, the small print seems I strain my eyes.

 

 

 

Lesson 5 -- Gale Virtual Reference Library

The GVRL is a bit more difficult for me to use.   I typed in spring festival in the main search and found 444 results.  I scrolled through those results and clicked on India, Scotland and Welsh.  You can find the festivals because they are high- lighted but you don’t always know if they happen in the spring without reading through a lot of information .  I liked the arrangement of the information about the Welsh festivals  the best in the Jr. Worldmark Encyclopedia because it listed six major holidays with the dates. 

When I searched for the festival foods I went to the Junior Worldmark Encyclopedia of Foods and Recipes of the World, 2012.  There were 270 results for spring festival foods and 648 results for festival food.  At the bottom of the table of contests countries are listed or you can go to the right side and choose a country.  When you click on that you can find many recipes for festival foods.  I was a bit disappointed that there were no recipes from the Netherlands because I am Dutch.

I could not find anything specifically under a search of spring festival games but in looking for the festivals I thoughts I had seen some games. 

I spent some more time and found somewhere a whole list of festivals listed of the world in chronological order but it was only a list and you would not click on the festival itself.  That would have been great for this assignment!

#2  I looked up several topics.  Childhood obesity had no results for 2012 listings but then I checked the year 2011 and there were 16 articles.  I thought that was a hot topic so maybe it takes some time to put the new topics in the system.  My husband has been studying a bit about the world food supply.  I could not find anything under world food supply but found 2 results for 2012 under just food supply. Food allergies were my last search.  Again I could find nothing for 2012 but there were 49 results when you limited the year to 2011.  I would imagine that these topics would have more current information soon?

   

 

 

Lesson 4 Proquest

#1  The novel Les Miserables

I typed in Les Miserables and a pop up underneath the search bar showed several things so I clicked on “Les Miserables novel” since the patron was not interested in the movie or musical version.  There were 1844 entries.

Going to the right side the document type under articles revealed 921 articles about Les Miserables.  The subject limiters resulted in 147 results under literary criticism.  I went to two of these articles.  A simple scrolling of the article first reveals the words Les Miserables highlighted in yellow.  So a simple scrolling of the article first and searching for the high lighted words would give you an idea of how many references of your subject was in the article. 

#2  Hurricane Sandy’s impact on Libraries

I went to advanced search and typed in Hurricane Sandy. In the next box I typed libraries.

I looked at the one article that resulted from this advanced search.   The Jan 01, 2013 copy of the Library Journal had an article “The Budget Balancing Act.” Again the highlighted words help you to scroll and find the information in the article.  According to this article the impact of Hurricane Sandy on libraries is still unknown.    

Lesson Three SIRS Discover and SIRS Issues Researcher

SIRS Discoverer

1. The third grader reading level should first be addressed.  I looked at a Lexile chart and determined that I would try to articles up to the 700 Lexile standard.  I used the advanced search and plugged in the Lexile range.

There were four articles on the solar system.  Three of the articles were not very long and so I think any of them could be acceptable.  One of the articles did not have a lot of reading but used a bar graph and had questions about the bar graph.  This would be a great visual aid for a person with reading problems.  Also an answer key was available. 

2.  I tried various means to research volcanoes.  A simple search showed 933 articles including graphics and web sites.  The advanced search actually had 705 articles.  It did not include the graphics and web sites.   Then I decided to look at the Maps of the World.  There were 21 graphics which included a variety of volcano pictures. 

 SIRS Issues Researcher

3.  I would go to the SIRS Issues Researcher and look under suicide.  There are many sources and at least six references to websites.  One reference was entitled “Teenagers, Suicide Behavior Timeline.”    This web site led to many links.  I am confident the committee would find excellent resources using the SIRS Issues Researcher. 

The web sites available when I googled suicide were endless.  However, it looked like a smorgasbord.  How do you know which web site the best site to try?  I can become over whelmed when I get too much information. Teachers do not have a lot of extra time.  The conciseness of SIRS Issues Researcher is a positive aspect.

4. There were over 1000 resources when I searched drought.  Then I looked up drought plus water restrictions.  There were 188 sources of information.  It appears that SIRS Issues Researcher would have valuable information for any discussion on drought and water restrictions . 

 

 

 

Lesson Two Learning Express

 Learning Express

#1  The first step would be to work with the child's teacher and so the teacher knows exactly what is happening with the student. 

 I would have the 4^th grade student go to the elementary school section in Learning Express and then click on the Reading Skills Improvement section.  Before he began I might make a chart to show score points with a prize if he reached an attainable goal.  I would start out with the ten 4^th Grade Reading Practice section. Since this only has nine questions per section it would be a good starting point.  After doing this section I would have him try the California 4^th Grade Reading Practice (54 questions)  and then the FCAT 4^th Grade Reading Practice.  (40 questions)

#2  I would have the high school graduate go  to the section of Job Search and Workplace Skills first.  She might want to look at the Business Writing section and  evaluate her grammar, vocab and  spelling to see if she needs any practice in those areas.  After that she should look at the items under job search, resumes and interviewing. 

#3  A person who is interesting in Nursing has a lot of resources to look at in  Learning Express.  Under Jobs and Careers he could look at the section on Nursing and Allied Health. This involves three sections. He might want to look at the Entrance Test Preparation to have an idea of all the tests on science and math that are involved in a health career.  The nursing school entrance exam is also available.

Another section is the License and Certification Test Preparation.  There are several preparation tests for nursing

Another option would be to go to the Career Guidance section where he could download or save to his center the e-book  Becoming a Nurse (240  pages) and look at the e-book Becoming a Health Care Professional.  It would be wise to look at the table of contents in each of these books.   

As far as the pharmacist information I could only find information under the License and Certification Test Preparation section under Nursing and Allied Health.   I found the Pharmacy Technician Exam to download. This is 251 pages with practice tests. 

Learning express does cover quite a few areas and age levels! 

Lesson One World Book Encyclopedias

 

World Book Kids I have been using this for the students in our lower grades. We have compared animals and they have looked at the Maps and More. The next assignment is to compare South Dakota to another state, specifically concerning population, state tree, state bird and state flowers. By looking at these items they will see other comparisons.
World Book Student Our students are participating in a Prairie Reader Contest. The next assignment will be to look up various authors in the biography section to find information about the authors on their book list.
World Book Advanced. I looked up Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. I did not realize there were back in time articles or web sites about this book and Mark Twain. It would be useful for the students to use these sites and perhaps to hear a section or two read in class when discussing classics or any book that is in the E-book Center.
World Book Discover gave me a few problems. I finally set up an account thinking that would help me. I can not get the How to do Research section to come up as an article. I just get an outline. I will go back to that. I think this would be a great way to review or to learn how to do research correctly. I do not have a lot of interaction with the high school students so will have to give this resource information to the high school teachers.

My old blog

It has been a long time since I have posted anything and may want to use this setting again.