Lesson 4 #2

2. At the top of the page, click "Basic Search" and type a search in the search box. Search for answers to the two questions posed at the beginning of the post: zinc or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn if you can't think of something else. Review the results, selecting an article to see what kind of information you can find. Test the "read to me" feature. Discuss your results.

I chose to search for anything relating to Jane Eyre. I found a great source that would be helpful for teachers or students. It relates the history and politics of Victorian England to the story--creating a wealth of scaffolding for understanding why Charlotte Bronte would create Jane the way she has. It also discusses pop culture in relation to the book. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys was written as a contrasting point of view to Bertha Masson's insanity. She portrays Rochester as the scheming, selfish, and arrogant husband that caused his wife to lose her mind--not as the intelligent, wonderful charismatic Rochester that Jane falls head over heels in love with.

Lesson 4 #1

1. Getting to know the titles in GVRL is similar to getting to know the titles of your library's reference collection. Click "show all" to view all the titles available in the collection. Click a book title of interest to you and access an article via the table of contents. Notice with the multi-volume titles, you can select which volume you look at. Discuss the title you selected and how you may use it.

I chose The Truth About the Music Business: A Grassroots Business and Legal Guide. Ed. Steve Moore. Boston: ArtistPro Publishing, 2005. p234-280.

I read a chapter about the copyright infringements that occur on the internet all the time--how P2P sharing has caused great losses for artists and record companies. The book was published in 2005, and I couldn't help but think how it is already out of date. Many young artists are now selling their songs right off of FaceBook. One of my former students posts a thirty second sample of his newest song and then invites his friends to buy the whole download from another web venue that serves as his store front.

I am thinking that the the general encyclopedias that deal with less time sensitive subjects might be the best use of this particular database.

I do love the index and the ability to click on the page number. I looked at the Big 5 record companies--and was led to the list with a complete set of information about each of those and their differences.

Lesson 3 #2 Proquest professional journal

2. Click the Publications tab at the top of the page. You will see an alphabetical list of the periodicals indexed in Proquest, the years included, and whether they are full text. Do a search for a journal in your profession by typing a title or keyword in the search box. Report your findings and observations.

I chose School Library Journal. I searched "fun fiction for high school boys." I found two articles. I set up the option to have articles emailed to me on this topic.

Lesson 3 #1 Proquest Basic Search

1. Do a basic search on something of interest to you. Report your findings and observations.

I chose "cochlear implants." My daughter is deaf and has one. The articles, totalling 349, started with the latest. I also chose full text documents and scholarly articles. I will definitely show my students the abstract tool, as no researcher has time to read through a whole list of articles and waste time. The abstract gives the sort of information that lets the researcher know whether or not he or she wants to proceed with the whole thing.

I have always been aware of the print and email functions, but I was excited to see the copy link and the "cite this" buttons. How very convenient. Most students now days have no idea how we old people used to use type writers and carbon copies and have to do footnotes for our teachers. I can remember getting to the bottom of the page and making a mistake and having to start all over. It's is simply magic now.

I also appreciated the subject headings to the right side which can relate to the research. I am interested in the linguistics approach to the speech instruction after children are implanted--and there was a link for that.

Lesson 2 Sirs Researcher #2

Select "Curriculum Pathfinders" on the right hand side of the window and mouse over the course subjects, noting the range of topics covered. Pick your favorite subject and discuss the information located there:

I chose Language Arts and Beowulf. I taught it for years and then studied it in Old English several years ago, spent 6 weeks learning the language. I have observed that over the past decade, the epic is less taught, but that it has made a sort of comeback in pop culture. This resource led me to many articles that confirmed my speculation. The articles ranged from advocating the original to acclamation for the most recent animated creations that stem from the theme of heroics. I can certainly see this as fodder for stimulating interest for kids.

Lesson 2 Sirs Researcher #1

Select a leading issue and discuss the information located there, noting the topic overview, research tools and articles.

I chose the Abortion topic. What I really love about this tool is the essential questions. This is so helpful in getting students and teachers to eliminate the garbage and to get right down to the nitty-gritty of finding answers that matter. I have always thought that teaching with essential questions and letting our students in on them would help them to "buy in" to why what we were studying matters.

The ability to look at pros and cons is wonderful, but I really like the "global impact." This gives new perspective on an old controversy.

Lesson 2D--other database feature Discoverer

I chose Educator's Resources. Then I chose content standards, specifically--

Eleventh Grade
Listening, Viewing, & Speaking Standards

Indicator 1: Students can listen, view, and speak to communicate, retrieve, interpret, and evaluate information.
11.LVS.1.1 (Evaluation) Students can evaluate strategies used in auditory and visual communications to inform, to persuade, and to entertain. See resources
11.LVS.1.2 (Evaluation) Students can evaluate logical and critical thinking used in communication. See resources
11.LVS.1.3 (Application) Students can implement rhetorical devices in oral presentations. See resources


I clicked on resources for the Evaluation strand. Unfortunately, it said more information was coming later.

Lesson 2C regional map--Discoverer

I chose the South American Physical map. I was really looking for more historical satellite maps--to show the loss of vegetation in the rain forest in the past 30 years--the kind that EROS near Sioux Falls used to take pictures of. I did not find that but I did find a link to the Christian Science Monitor from 2000:
Atlantic Forest in More Peril than Amazon. This is similar to what I was thinking. I think any student or teacher who needs geographic or political information, as well as wanting to know about anything related to the physicality of the land would be interested in this site.

Lesson 2B SIRS Discover Databse Features

Selecting the country Morocco, I found the map, a chronology of the political and cultural history, demographics, and economics. On the map, there were some links to picures and other sources. I have travelled in Morocco in the 1980's, so I was interested in some of the places and experiences I had then. I read one article about travellers (written in a Palm Beach, Florida newspaper) that gave a rather scathing report of their travels in Morocco. They had stayed in hotels that were dirty and had no electricity. Our stay was with a family, and it was a wonderful experience. However, we travelled by train, and this family had travelled by car. Here is another example where students could be reminded of point of view.

Lesson 2A -Sirs Discoverer

I did look up Armadillos (again). There were 6 pictures. What I found interesting was in the newspaper articles. The last one I looked at was written in a Kearney, NE newspaper and had nothing to do with real armadillos. The article was about a science/space fair competition called the X Cup. And Armadillo refers to the name of an institution in Texas: Armadillo Aerospace of Mesquite, Texas.

This would be a great opportunity to show students how even with narrowed searching, they still have to use their thinking skills. Not everything can be done for us.

Lesson 1C

Our language department features a culture day/week each year in the form of native foods, introductory classes for teachers and students--taught by students--and the library supports this with exhibits of native artists, language, literature, video. Much of this resource would be useful for this. I might have the animal images on the screen so that students could see both picture and Spanish name at the same time.

Lesson 1B

This link led to only one main text article, but it referenced the scientific classification "Ornithorhynchus anatinus." By clicking on this, the researcher is led to much more information and subcategories related to science and evolution of such mammals.

Lesson One 1A

I looked up the platypus. RC secondary librarians were all sent to the elementary schools one day per week a couple of years ago to help with library services. I cannot count how many times students wanted to find a picture of the duck billed platypus. This is one I had used, but I had not listened to the audio. This would be excellent for students who often fail to understand the meaning because of fluency problems.