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.

Lesson 10 Wrap Up

It is time to wrap up this course. It has been a great learning experience. The availability of so many good resources was the biggest discovery I have made. Now I feel much more comfortable in suggesting that the state library web site be used because I have taken the time to look at all the resources that are available.
I am already looking forward to our teacher in-services next fall when electronic resources will be a featured topic. We are looking forward to Jane instructing us. After the in-service I hope to discuss with each individual teacher how we can work together to utilize these resources during the school year.
I have a ring binder that contains many of the things I have printed off from these sessions. With a bit more organization it will also be a very helpful tool!
I have urged parents to get their own family state library card in our weekly announcements and will be sending a letter home in the report cards with some final instructions and encouragement for our students to use the state library web site this summer.
Thanks for making this course available. I really appreciated it!