Writing Research Questions

William Badke's book Research Strategies: Finding Your Way Through the Information Fog includes some very useful information.  Early in the book he discusses the importance of developing an interesting and a good research question.  Definitely, some questions are better than others, and, frankly, some are just bad-- they have very little promise at being successful in an academic setting.  Following is his summary comment:

In my experience, the best research questions are simple ones that still require a good deal of analysis to answer.  If you start with a highly complex question your analysis is going to have be that much more complex.  The ideal is to have a question so simple and clear that you can actually see the goal before you, in your mind's eye. and the path you need to take to get there.  Yet the answer must require some struggle to come to.  And it must be capable of leading you to provide concrete evidence to support it.  You use the evidence you gather as a means to discover the solution rather than as the solution itself.  (36)

Badke's appendix offers a list of ten research questions that he has qualified as good and bad.  He notes that a bad research question is one that requires a yes/no answer, or requires a simple discovery of a fact.  This is not a college research question, but a report.  He writes: "A research question is more than discovery of a fact.  It has to deal with an issue that can be analyzed in depth" (233).  Therefore, a question asking how long is the longest bridge is not as good as a question asking what kinds of materials would be needed to build the longest bridge.  Remember, does it ask for analysis?  If it does, then this is better than a research questions that only requires the discovery of a fact, or a report on a set of facts.  College should challenge students to think and evaluate, rather than just regurgitate information.

Another bad question may ask a question that demands a connection between two things or phenomenon that cannot be determined with available statistics, reports, or publications in general.  Badke uses this question to illustrate this point: "What effect does homelessness have on the price of beds in Canada?" (233).  Finding statistics or reports that would connect these two aspects of the question would be mighty difficult.

"First Business Inn Deluxe Double Room."  See Viewology.net.

Other bad questions may be unfocused.  What has happened to __________ politician since the scandal that ruined their career?  What is going on with _____________ since she earned her billions?  The broad nature of these questions make them undesirable as research questions.  There could be hundreds of thousands of sources on a popular cultural figure, so how does the student know what to filter and what to reference in the paper?  Badke's suggestion for a better question goes like this: "Is Bill Gates' plan to give away a large portion of his wealth sufficiently well organized to ensure that the money achieves the goals he has set for it?" (234).  The student can envision a clear path to investigate and will understand when he/she has come close to answering it adequately.  The previously broad question would require a book with multiple chapters.

If the connections between two different occurrences can be seen, then this kind of question may be great for research.  Badke brings up the question of a country's Child Welfare Program, asking if the scrutiny in the media over the last few years has spurred new legislation.  A student could go and look at popular literature (newspapers and magazines) to determine whether increased publicity on this topic did in fact precede movements in state or national legislative bodies to change the law.

"[19/365] celtic connections." By werewegian.

Overly simplistic questions that call for a report and not an analysis are bad research questions.  For example: "What happened in Afghanistan during the last ten years?"  "What is going on with South American governments?"  Choose a particular aspect of the larger topic and ask a more focused question.  Sometimes it is better to ask "How?" and "Why?"  This requires some digging and searching.

One good question: "How could the looting of museums in Iraq in 2003 have been avoided?" (235).  Research would uncover how the lootings took place, which would open up the field for the researcher to choose some viable plan for preventing a similar occurrence from happening again.  Badke writes: "In hindsight, it should be possible to look at what happened and show what protections could have been devised to prevent the looting.  Considerable writing has been done on the issue, so there should be lots of information" (235).  In the end, students will want to be able to find lots of sources to back up their main points.  Being able to focus on the points within the sources that relate directly to their research question will save them time and yield a clearer argument.

Avoid research questions that ask for multiple points to be addressed.  Remember to be simple and avoid too much complexity, particularly if your paper is limited to six or eight pages in length.  If you as the writer are confused about all the points you are trying to make, then the reader may well be just as confused.

"Leaning, New style sount, stacked 3 high" by Oran Viriyincy on Flickr.com

 

Library Instruction Handouts & Worksheets

Each year the Early College Program at Idaho State University invites high school teachers involved with the program to come to the Pocatello campus for instruction.  These instructors teach the classes wherein students can earn college credit at reduced rates before even graduating form high school.  On several occasions I have been able to provide a workshop, showing and demonstrating how to access and use the library resources. 

This year, rather than demonstrating and talking the whole time, I decided to put them to work exploring the resources in groups.  Each individual received handouts that highlighted search strategies and important points about all the resources; however, individuals were divided into groups and handed a group worksheet with questions to work on together.  Each group reported their discoveries back to the class.  One thing I failed to do was to explicitly tie the handouts to the worksheet and encourage them to use the handout while answering questions on the worksheet.  At the beginning, one of the teachers was excited to get copies of the group worksheet, so she could have her students learn from this activity.

It did not go over quite as well as I hoped as several groups had too much time and others need more.  Some of the teachers did not seem very engaged.

Following is a short description of each of the handouts I updated or created for this workshop:

• The CQ Researcher handout shows how to access this database via the ISU Library homepage and offers reasons why this may be helpful plus it gives a short description of the resource.  By the way, several teachers seemed quite interested in learning about this resource, asking if it were available to students not dually enrolled at the University.  Unfortunately it is not.  Much of this information was found on the CQ Researcher About page.

• Evaluating Information: Applying the CRAAP Test offers criteria for students to apply to sources they find to determine their reliability. 
• Since we have access to many EBSCOhost databases, I shared an EBSCO Best Practices handout, which has been created by EBSCO.  They show some of the basic search functions and offer some useful tips for searching.
• The ISU Library is just beginning to implement the PRIMO search tool, but it still seemed important to make these teachers aware of this new tool, so I created this PRIMO Search handout.

• Perhaps the handout I worked on the longest was the Research Pyramid handout.  It shows how a student can progress from broad/general information to focused and specific information during the research process.  I like to explain how it can be helpful to find reference articles in encyclopedias, handbooks, guidebooks, etc., because they give an overview of the topic, identify areas of focus, and sometimes point to other useful books and articles, thus launching students on a potentially successful research trajectory.  Books can be worth more than 5 or 10 articles sometimes, if you find one that is relevant to your research question.  Articles can be easily accessed online from home; our e-book collection is still not very large.  As the authors, students express their opinions and can cite personal experience to illustrate or bolster an argument.  They may also interview an expert or someone worth quoting in their paper.  This illustrates the research process.

Research Pyramid.  The research process often starts with the general and progresses to the specific.

Do you still create handouts?  Do you use handouts when given them?  Are they helpful in this digital world where we now live?  What makes a good handouts?  Do you print them or just share them online now?

Please cite me or the Eli M. Oboler Library at Idaho State University as the source if you want to use any of the handouts that I created.

College Students and Information-Literacy Realities

Some of the YouTube videos on information literacy topics are quite fascinating.  Every once in a while I re-discover them again.  Project Information Literacy at the University of Washington still has some great videos up.  These are create by the Information School Here are a few that I enjoy watching

1. "PIL InfoLit Dialog, No. 1: Wikipedia"
2. "PIL InfoLit Dialog, No. 2: Procrastination"
3. "PIL InfoLit Dialog, No. 3: Frustration"
4. "PIL InfoLit Dialog, No. 4: Strategies"
5. "PIL InfoLit Dialog, No. 5: Context"

These videos may be good ways to start a class discussion about information literacy or the topic of the day.  They might also be good for starting discussions with library instructors, campus faculty, administrators, etc. 

Have you seen these videos?  How have they been useful?  What do you think of them?

"Information Literacy Toolkit."  by heyjudegallery

Finding Primary Sources for U.S. History Papers

Where can you go if you need primary sources for a research paper in your history class?  As a reference librarians, sometimes it is challenging to help students looking for primary sources.  Wikipedia defines a primary source like this:

 Primary source is a term used in a number of disciplines to describe source material that is closest to the person, information, period, or idea being studied.

The University of Maryland Libraries also explains the differences between primary, secondary, and tertiary sources in more detail, offering useful examples.  Essentially an item or document created by a single person at the time of the event can also be considered a primary source, so primary sources could be any of the following:

• Letters between individuals
• Diaries or personal journals
• Speeches written and given at an event
• Newspaper articles written at the time of the event
• Original studies published in peer-reviewed journals
• Books reviews of titles that are recently published (Some people may argue that any book review is a primary source as it recounts the recent event of someone's experience or reaction to reading a book, whether it is a new book or not.)

 Milestone Documents of American Leaders: Exploring the Primary Sources of Notable Americans. Ed. Paul Finkelman.  Dallas, TX: Schlager Group, 2009.

This four-volume title contains many primary documents of well-known Americans, beginning with colonial figures like Abigail Adams and George Washington while also including more recent figures like Sandra Day O'Conner and George W. Bush.  Yes, this could be one of the best places for finding primary sources.

The first entry in volume #4 features Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. (1908-1972), who was a U.S. Congressman in the 1940s through the 1960s.  His entry commences with these life details, plus mention of the three primary sources associated with him:

• Speech on Civil Rights (1955)
• "Black Power: A Form of Godly Power" (1967)
• "Black Power and the Future of Black America" (1971)

Each entry holds to the same structure: overview, explanation and analysis of documents, impact and legacy, key sources, further readings, essential quotes, questions for further study, and, last of all, the primary documents themselves.  The overview about Representative Powell's life provides specific details about his life that are relevant to the documents in question.  In the pages that explain and analyze the documents there appears a timeline of his life, noting significant events mostly related to his political life.  A glossary explains words, contextual references, and may give an entire person's name when a partial one is given in the text.

Each of the entries include a large, full-page photo on the page before the article begins.  Use the subject index at the end of the fourth volume if you need to find where certain persons or ideas are mentioned within the four-volume set.  Placed before the index is a list of documents by category:

• Correspondence and Diaries
• Essays, Reports, and Manifestos
• Interviews
• Legal
• Legislative
• Military
• Presidential/Executive
• Speeches/Addresses (looks like the lengthiest section)

Each volume contains a "Contents" section at the beginning for the whole set, listing all the individuals in alphabetical order.

All in all, this appears to be a great resource for anyone looking to find primary sources of American leaders.  Take a look in your library's catalog to see if they have this reference set.  If your library does have this title, they may also have the E-book version that you could access online.  Look for a link to access the E-book.

Following is one of the "Essential Quotes" from Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.:

Tremendous changes are taking place in our country eradicating the concept of second-class citizenship.  Yet the United States Congress has done absolutely nothing in this sphere.  We are behind the times.  We are a legislative anachronism.  In an age of atomic energy, our dynamic is no more powerful than a watermill.  (Speech on Civil Rights, 1955, p.1740)

Choosing a Topic for a College Research Paper

Three weeks ago I began teaching an information-literacy course.  This one-credit course runs for eight weeks and is called ACAD 1199: Information Research.  In week two we talked about choosing a topic, brainstorming, and narrowing down a topic to a manageable size for a 5-6 page college paper. 

For one of these classes, I created a PowerPoint presentation, outlining some of my ideas and those of Mary W. George, as written in her book The Elements of Library Research: What Every Student Needs to Know.  Quite simply, this presentation is titled "Choosing a Topic."  Take a look at it, and let me know what yo think.  Still, sometimes it is a challenge to know how to help students narrow down a topic to one that interests them but still avoids trying to do too much.

What do you tell students when they need to narrow a topic?

If you are a student currently, what research projects have carried off successfully?  What made it work so well?

"Narrow City."  by Nick Peligno.

This photo seemed appropriate with the topic of narrowing down a topic as it appears that this street gradually gets narrower.  I like the colors, shapes, and lines.  Seems like a fun photo.  Thank you for sharing this Flickr.com, Nick Peligno.

Studies about College Students, Libraries, and Information Literacy

A friend of mine, who used to be the library director here at the ISU Library, shared the following link to an article from Inside HigherEd: "What Students Don't Know."  It confirmed a lot that I already knew, experienced, or suspected.  Students hardly know where the Library is, rarely ask for help from a librarian (even though it would help them immensely, ease their anxiety, and increase their efficiency), often overestimate their (re)search skills, rely entirely too much on Google, apply Google search statement logic to database searching, do not search Google effectively, and do just enough research to get by or to "satisfice."

The article mentioned that librarians and faculty are partly to blame.  Librarians sometime overestimate the "digital natives" abilities, sometimes intimidating them further.  Faculty look at librarians as good for finding sources but not good at conducting research.  Steve Kolowich writes a good article here, citing several studies that back up the claims listed above.  He writes: "The most alarming finding in the ERIAL studies was perhaps the most predictable: when it comes to finding and evaluating sources in the Internet age, students are downright lousy."  What can we do as librarians to help students?  How can we get them to ask us for assistance beyond locating the restroom?  We can help students with research.

Students could benefit from instruction on how to use Google, so they can understand how it differs from the academic databases:

Throughout the interviews, students mentioned Google 115 times -- more than twice as many times as any other database. The prevalence of Google in student research is well-documented, but the Illinois researchers found something they did not expect: students were not very good at using Google. They were basically clueless about the logic underlying how the search engine organizes and displays its results. Consequently, the students did not know how to build a search that would return good sources. (For instance, limiting a search to news articles, or querying specific databases such as Google Book Search or Google Scholar.) (Kolowich)

Perhaps we can ask that classes come to the Library for more instruction, maybe we can visit their classroom, share contact information and handouts, or maybe we could even ask to be embedded in the course management software, i.e. Blackboard or Moodle.  Moreover, we can smile more frequently at the reference desk and be more approachable. 

With more students working another job and/or dealing with family responsibilities, librarians need to be practical in working with students.  Librarians can tout their skills to students by telling them they can teach skills and strategies that will help them save time and become more efficient with their research.  Give some tips that will make the research process less frustrating.  Kolowich references one of the studies to support the claim that librarians are more relevant than ever: "The evidence from ERIAL lends weight to their counterargument: librarians are more relevant than they have ever been, since students need guides to shepherd them through the wilderness of the Web."

If you are a librarian, read this article.

What can librarians do to garner more trust from students and faculty?  What can we do to increase the information literacy skills of the students?

"Shepherd and Baby Lambs." See FreeFoto.com. by Ian Britton.

More Tutorials for Graduate Students

Last week I taught a graduate student workshop for some physical science and sports science graduate students.  After updating a PE for Grad Students site, I created a Jing tutorial, explaining what changes I had made that may be helpful for them.  Unfortunately, it exceeded my goal of less than three minutes (it is 3:47 long).

On that site is a link to a tutorial a graduate student in the College of Education's Instructional Design program helped me create using Camtasia.  This tutorial is the first I have created using this powerful software.  Honestly, I only recorded the tutorial, and the graduate student edited the content.  Last week I uploaded it to TeacherTube with the title: Research Success for Graduate Students. Again, this tutorial is a bit lengthy.  It seems that students prefer short, brief tutorials, so who know how many will even look at it.  Hopefully, the conscientious graduate students will watch and benefit from viewing it.

Are screencasts worth doing?  Have you benefited from viewing screencasts?  Do you create screencasts yourself?  Please share what you do and why.

I still need to read the article "Do Screencasts Really Work?"  If you have read this article, please comment on it.  Do you agree?

Finding Open Access Scholarship and Information about Open Access

I completed a display on open access publishing today.  I learned that researchers at ISU can find open access journals via our A-Z Journal List.  For example, a search for Communications in Information Literacy will return a page like this:

The green hyperlinks take users to the Communications in Information Literacy homepage, where a username and password is required to access their articles, but it is still free.

Anyone can find and use open-access (OA) journals.  To browse and search OA journals, take a look at the Directory of Open Access Journals, which is also known as the DOAJ.   Take a look at Mallikarjun Dora's post on the "Growth of DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals)."  The post includes a useful graph to visualize the increase in the number of journals available with open access research articles.

Even more open-access articles can be found on the following sites:

•  Hindawi Publishing: a rapidly growing publisher with more than 200 open-access journals
• PLoS ONE: the world's largest journal.

For more information about open access, look at the Galter Health Sciences Library's "Open Access Resources Guide."  This library serves the Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine.

Most of the information I gathered came from Peter Suber's "Overview of Open Access."  Find definitions and learn the differences between Gratis OA and Libre OA.  It is really quite a useful site if you want to understand more about OA, copyright, Creative Commons, etc.

Other useful sites on the topic include, though certainly are not limited to:

• Open Access Week
• SPARC: Scholarly Publishers and Academic Resources Coalition
• SPARC Newsletter
• Education Podcasts on OA
• Vimeo's Open Access Videos

The head of our acquisition's department says that scholarly journal inflation rates typically rise 9%  each year.  Normal inflation tends to be just 3% each year.  Some scholarly journals cost as much as a brand new car.

 

See here. 

In a good year when academic library budgets do not get cut, it may still mean some academic journals get axed, due to the high inflation rate.  Perhaps this is why many librarians have begun to promote open access publishing, inviting professors to retain their copyrights and initiating institutional repositories to retain access to the research created by their own researchers.

Have you been involved in the open access movement?  How?  

Do you publish in open-access journals?  Why?

Have you negotiated your copyright with publishers?  How did that go?

Below is a Wordle image highlighting the words used in this post.

Spanish Resources and Declassified Documents

Today I taught a Spanish 3381 class, which was a welcome opportunity to practice my Spanish-speaking skills.  The instructor asked that I show students how to find resources that will help them with their assignment.  Students need to write a paper and give an oral presentation on a Latin American country, focusing on a specific current event (last 50 years more or less).  Additionally, students are encouraged to search out declassified documents to see, as much as possible, the United States involvement in some of these events.  Of course, they are also asked to look for sources in Spanish that will help them understand their topic, such as the Dirty War in Argentina, Pinochet's government in Chile, the overthrow of Arbenz's government in Guatemala, or Madero's in Mexico.

Fortunately, one of my colleagues had taught this class five years ago and had a handout with a list of resources to get me started.  Database subscriptions change over time at academic institutions, and ours is not exception.  The part that worried me the most was finding declassified government documents.  In a casual encounter with the instructor last week, she indicated that Georgetown University had made resources available for researchers to find declassified documents.  When I looked at their site, I found that they do have databases for searching these documents; however, they required a login and password.  Again, a colleague of mine who is the government documents librarians really helped quite a bit in pointing me in the right direction.  Her efforts helped me improve upon the resources my first colleague shared with me, and the results can be found on this Declassified Documents page.

To see all my resources for this class, go to the Spanish 3381 site I created.  Here is the Tiny URL for the site: http://tinyurl.com/4sh9ywd.

Si quieres encontrar documentos desclasificados, utilice al siguiente sitio: Declassified Documents.  Claro, la mayoria de los documentos que se encuentran en los sitios del gobierno de los Estados Unidos de America son en ingles.  Si necesitas una traduccion de la pagina <<Declassified Documents>> dimelo.  Tratare' de ayudarte.

Multimedia Tutorials with Adobe Presenter

Today I received word that an article I helped to co-author has been published.  InformaWorld's Journal of Library & Information Services in Distance Learning published "Staying on Top of Your Game and Scoring Big with Adobe Presenter Multimedia Tutorials."  Adobe Presenter works with Microsoft PowerPoint and allows users to record and edit audio on each slide of a presentation.

Take a look at it and let me know what you think.

Cool YouTube Video on Visual Data/Statistics

"Hans Rosling's 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes - The Joy of Stats - BBC Four"


This short video by Hans Rosling rocks! Statistics can be dull, cumbersome, and complex, but he succeeds in making them interesting, relatively simple, and relevant.  Indeed, he infuses a large dosage of hope regarding the future of our world with his concluding remarks.

Information literacy involves knowing when you need information, knowing how to access it, and applying the information ethically and effectively.  Sometimes we need statistics.  Each country gathers demographic data differently.  In a recent trip to Canada I learned that Canadian statistics can be aggravating to find and interpret.  In fact, one individual lamented that some of the census data did not continue from one iteration to another.  They changed the questions, so graduate students looking for longitudinal information in a particular area could not be extracted.

My sense is that U.S. statistics may include some of these same frustrating flaws as far as research goes.  In case you may be interested in finding U.S. statistics, take a look at our resource page.  Find links to the Census Bureau, FedStats, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the Bureau of Labor Statistics.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics includes the Occupational Outlook Handbook and a site with career information for high school students.  I have always like the Statistical Abstract of the United States when looking for quick statistics.

Finding Native American/Indian Treaties

Last week I presented to my colleagues some updates to the Resources by Subject: Political Science page. In that presentation I pointed out one of our resources Public Documents Masterfile, which can aid researchers in finding government documents. Essentially, it serves as an index of other indexes. Therefore, this database does not provide full-text access, but it refers you to other sources, when can then refer you to the actual items with the full-text documents. Welcome to the world of government and legal research.

As an example, I showed how to find treaties between the U.S. government and the Shoshone/Bannock Tribes. A search for Shoshone Treaty brings back these results:

Selecting the first option with four records bring up this
"page:


Copying and pasting these titles into our catalog will help you find where they are located in our Library.  Actually, the following title Descriptive Catalog of the Government Publications of the United States will return a negative search, because the physical volume in question spell catalog like this: catalogue.  Whenever a title search does not work for me, my next step is to conduct an author search, which happens to be Poore, Benjamin Perley: .

The author search worked, and I found a call number but could not locate it on the shelf, so our government documents librarian helped me find it.  The numbers after the colon "963" and "991" seemed to refer to page numbers.  Nothing on page 963 seemed to refer to the Shoshone Indians, but there was something on page 991:

Report on the Shoshone and Bannock Indians.  See Columbus Delano.  Jan.22, 1874.  House Ex.Docs., No.61, 43d Cong.,1st sess., Vol.IX  2pp.  Transmitting information in regard to articles of convention concluded with the chiefs and headmen of the Shoshone and Bannock Indians for relinquishment of a portion of their reservation in Wyoming Territory.

Then my government documents colleague directed me to the CIS US Serial Set Index: 35th-45th Congresses 1857-1879 (Part II). Part II are "Finding Lists," so if you know what you want, that's the volume you need. If you are looking for documents according to their subject take a look at the two subject indexes on those sessions of congress.

Now we looked up the 43rd Congress, 1st session, which we found on page 1540. (Incidentally, this volume started on page 1293.) We found the title of House Executive Document 61: "Articles of convention with Shoshone and Bannock Indians for relinquishment of portion of their reservation in Wyoming Territory. Yes, we already had that information, so the most important thing at this point was the Volume and Serial numbers for the Serial Set. These were Vol. 9 Serial 1607.

We hiked up to the third floor, and, of course, the government documents librarian knows where the Serial Set is located, so I just followed. It turns out that we lack Serial number 1607. 1606 and 1608 sat on the shelf, but no 1607; however, someone had photocopied House Executive document 102, inserted it between a hard cover, and placed it on the shelf. This one did not relate directly to the Shoshone Bannock Tribes, but it did relate to Idaho: "Reservation for Indians of Colville agency, and for Coeur d'Alene Indians, of Territory of Idaho.

Since we could not locate it on the shelves, we went to the microfiche cabinets and found the microfiche that had Serial 1607, which included H.Ex.Doc.61. Today I went and refreshed my memory on using the microfiche and microfilm readers, scanned a copy of the two-page document. On one of my Google Sites pages it is the pdf document titled Shoshone Treaty.

Faster Way to Locate Native American/Indian Treaties

Yes, it does not have to take you this long to locate these treaties. Oklahoma State University has digitized many, if not all, of the treaties between the U.S. federal government and the sovereign tribes. Make sure to search Kappler's Indian Affairs:
.

Our Library does have a print copy of Kappler's Indian Affairs. Volume II on Laws and Treaties is where you would look to find the treaties. The index at the back points to the pages necessary for the appropriate tribal treaty in question. See pages 694, 848-51,859, and 1020 for treaties that mention the Shoshoni or Shoshone/Bannock Tribes. A look at our copy will show that these pages have been frequently looked at, since these are the nearest tribes to Pocatello, where Idaho State University resides.

Chief Pokatello helped negotiate the 1863 treaty; hence the name of the city here. The Shoshone/Bannock tribes live on the Fort Hall reservation.

Thank you, Oklahoma State University. Digital access takes much less time than hunting down the print copy.

Succeed in the Oboler Library

Watch this longer video, which gives more in-depth information about ISU's Eli M. Oboler Library while also trying to mix in a little humor periodically. The characters' voices are machine-automated, so they sound a bit panned, or artificial. The video creator did forget to say that the reference desk is only open until 9:00 p.m. on regular weekdays.

How can I find a report on reading statistics in the U.S.?

Today a newsletter called Smart Libraries was left in my mailbox. ALA TechSource publishes this newsletter. On the third page, they include an article on the most recent reading report created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which is titled "Reading on the Rise. Basically, they claim that reading has increased in the last few years--not dramatically, but they have been able to measure it to some degree.

Naturally, this is good news. Reading in general, even literary titles like novels, poetry, and plays, tends to result in social benefits. In a previous report NEA completed in 2004, reading had gone down: Reading at Risk Report.

I appreciate that the author of this newsletter article, Tom Peters, inserted statistics on persons who listen to audiobooks, why they do it, and how they are more likely to read a physical book than someone who doesn't listen to an audiobook. Most people find audiobooks at a local library and do so for long trips, exercise, or to reduce monotony on their daily commutes. It appears, though, that downloaded electronic books are becoming more popular. He found many of these statistics via the APA Press Release.

Libraries, of course, promote reading, and librarians should be aware of the different formats in which people "read" and make them as easily accessible as possible.

LexisNexis Academic = Great for Finding Court Cases

One of our most versatile resources, this database provides access to scholarly research, newspaper articles, business data, and legal materials. It allows its users to search the archives of specific newspapers or journals, including the local paper like the Post Register and national ones like The New York Times. The legal tab provides options for searching tax law, federal and state cases, Shepard’s Citations, as well as federal and state laws (the database uses the word “code” here). In the business tab you can search for company-specific information: its history, current value of their stocks, names of its executives, contact information, and more. For help with this resource, talk to the librarians at the reference desk.

I just helped a student today find some Idaho case called State v. Guzman, which he knew had taken place in 1992. Under the Legal tab, LexisNexis allows you to input case names by providing two empty search boxes with a "v." between them. When we searched for "State v. Guzman" there were about 200 results that turned up, and we even had specified "Idaho" as a source or option. When he keyed "Idaho State v. Guzman," we found it right away.

LexisNexis Academic seems to be a lot more user friendly than it used to be a few years ago, but many still consider it to be user unfriendly. The way they display the results it not useful--the typeface does not make it easy to separate the different elements of the result. It can still be a very powerful database, though.

Finding Dissertations & Theses

In the last two months I have been working on a tutorial that incorporates an audio component. The Instructional Technology Resource Center or ITRC helped me download Adobe Presenter software, which allows me to add audio to a PowerPoint Presentation. They allow faculty and staff on campus to publish these audio presentations to their servers.

It really was not as difficult as I feared that it would be. I created a tutorial on finding dissertations and theses at Idaho State University: http://breeze1.isu.edu/dissertations. It begins with a brief overview of the the ProQuest database, Dissertations and Theses--A&I, which can really be a useful source for finding graduate studies on all kinds of subjects. Abstracts and full citations appear with other information, such as the names of committee members. They also provide options for purchasing a copy in various formats, beginning at $34.00. It is a good place to start when doing graduate research and discovering research that has already been done, so you do not duplicate your efforts.

Then I go through the steps of securing a dissertation via Interlibrary Loan. Colleagues in the Interlibrary Loan (ILL) department like to emphasize that a thesis or dissertation is considered a book, and requestors need to remember this.

Not all institutions allow their theses and dissertations to be borrowed; however, researchers do have the opportunity to purchase a copy through the Dissertation Service. They just need to fill out a Purchase a Thesis/Dissertation Form. A photocopy of the book will be made and sent to the proper persons; their university account will be billed $29.00.

Finally, I conclude the tutorial with tips on how to found in-house theses and dissertations at ISU's Oboler Library. The Library's catalog still serves as a great tool (and probably the only tool) for browsing ISU's theses and dissertations online. Using keywords such as "thesis 'idaho state'" will allow anyone to browse all the theses and dissertations. It so happens that even for the dissertations the keyword "thesis" works, since the bibliographic record contains a note, saying it is a "Thesis" for a doctoral degree, or a doctoral thesis.

If grad students or faculty want to limit the results to a specific department, then they can just add the name of that department to the Keyword Boolean or Quick search: "thesis 'idaho state' anthropology." This will retrieve more results than a search on the subject heading. For example, "Dissertations, Academic--Idaho State University. Dept. of Political Science" will only retrieve 21 results, yet a Keyword Boolean search for "thesis and 'idaho state' and 'political science'" will yield 60 results. The subject headings are still relatively new, so if you also want the older titles written by former students I recommend this second search.

The tutorial, "How Can I Find Dissertations: Using ISU's Resources to Conduct More Exhaustive Research" lasts for twelve minutes and thirty-two seconds (12:32). Take a look at it and let me know what you think.

Reference Books About Marine Mammals

In many of the instruction sessions I teach, I like to emphasize the importance of consulting reference materials. Reading an article from an encyclopedia can help you know the basics on a given topic. Reference materials generally do not need to be cited, as they often include information that the experts in that field consider common knowledge on that topic. In several places the index finger symbol is used in close association with reference books, and rightly so, because reference books point or refer you to other sources. Near the end of an encyclopedia article a bibliography or list of sources appears, directing you to sources that contain more in-depth research/information.

Here are some more reference books worth looking at:

1. Encyclopedia of Human-Animal Relationships: contains animal rights information, articles on anthropomorphism, and entries about humans and animals in art, biology, economics, film, etc. Useful features include cross references, side bars, list of and references.

Some may find it annoying that major topics may be split among different volumes, so a section on animals in film might start in one volume and conclude in another. Since there is no list of subheadings, consult the index to find specific items of interest. The art section appeared to be rather short.

Call Number: QL85 .E53 2007.
Volumes: 4

Note: The editor of this encyclopedia is Marc Bekoff, a founder of an animal-rights group, so the encyclopedia will be a bit slanted in that direction.

2. Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals provides information on all types of ocean mammals and includes 16 color images toward the beginning of the volume. It has over 1400 pages and includes a useful index.
Call Number: QL713.2 .E63 2002

Entries give specific information on various species, such as their taxonomy, anatomical and physiological feature, population size, ecology, eating or foraging habits, life cycles, behavior, demographic parameters, and relations with humans. Maps portray their habitat ranges, black-and-white photographs give an idea of what they look like, and a list of references point to further information.

General articles talk about marine-mammal fossils, coloration of marine mammals, sociobiology, swimming, and many other related subjects.

3. Marine Mammals of the World: A Comprehensive Guide to their Identification is a newer volume (2008) and includes beautiful color photographs of animals in their aquatic settings. It contains a glossary of terms, an index, references, skull morphology, and a dichotomous identification key.

As the title suggests, this book seeks to aid individuals so they may "more easily identify marine mammals that they may come across during trips to sea, while walking on the beach, or when visiting a museum or other research collection" (xi). By marine mammals they mean "cetaceans (whales, dolphins, and porpoises), pinnipeds (seals sea lions, and walruses), sirenians (manatees, dugongs, and sea cows), marine and sea otters, and the polar bear. [...] The term marine mammal, therefore, implies no systematic or taxonomic relationship. In fact, the cetaceans are more closely related to camels and hippos than they are to other marine mamals, the pinnipeds have more in common with bears and weasels, and the sirenians are more closely allied to elephants and hyraxes. These differences no withstanding, however, all marine mammals have one thing in common--they derive all (or most) of their food from marine (or sometimes fresh) water" (1). Not surprisingly, this book is organized by these group distinctions.

CQ Researcher

One of my favorite databases is CQ Researcher, which provides articles on "hot topics" each week by qualified writers. Not long ago I wrote a few potential blurbs about this database and sent them to the editor of our bathroom newsletter. It occurred to me just yesterday that these blurbs would be good for this information-literacy blog. This type of database seems like it would be particularly useful to those in Speech and lower-division courses where students need to discuss or write about current topics of interest. The editor's final edition appear at the end of this post.

Blurb #1

"Mexico’s Drug War: Is the violence spilling into the U.S.?" This is the title to a recent report published by CQ Researcher. This database discusses issues of current interest each week in the same format, looking at the past, present, and future of a particular phenomenon. Some students like the section where two experts take opposing sides to the question at hand. Others appreciate the extensive list of references at the end as it launches them on a fruitful research trajectory.

[Trajectory: adj. 1. Physics. Of or pertaining to that which is thrown or hurled through the air or space. N. 1. a. Physics. The path of any body moving under the action of given forces; by many modern writers restricted to that of a body not known to be moving, like a planet, in a closed curve or orbit; esp. the curve described by a projectile in its flight through the air.]

Blurb #2

Do you need to know more about an issue of current interest? Congressional Quarterly Researcher can fulfill your need. Each week it publishes substantive articles that deal with important phenomena in our society, typically with deep political ramifications. Take a look at the most recent issues, browse by topic, or search for issues important to you. Topics include cyberbullying, the drug war in Mexico, obesity in children, steroids in sports, global warming, etc.

Blurb #3

Will you need to write a term paper or a speech this semester? Take a look at one of the Library’s most interesting databases, CQ Researcher. It includes salient articles relevant to today’s most pressing issues, from Mexico’s drug wars to financial bailouts, gun rights to declining birth rates, and gay marriage to internet accuracy. Experts take sides on issues, outlining the pros and cons from their own perspectives. A large bibliography or works-cited section also proves useful for those willing to do more fulfilling, in-depth research.

Blurb # 4

Are you ready to branch out from the normal databases you usually access? This database, CQ Researcher, can help you understand issues of importance for our country, including a breakdown of its history, current situation, and future outlook. Find articles on China’s human rights, Mexico’s drug war, cyberbullying, race and politics, and much more. Each article offers other sources of information for digging deeper into the subject.

Editor's Final Edition Titled:

"For Current Events & Controversial Issues!"
Need to write a speech or a term paper on a "hot topic"? Try CQ Researcher, one of the Library's most interesting databases. Weekly reports focus on specific topics, from financial bailouts to Mexico's drug wars; gun rights to declining birth rates; gay marriage to Internet accuracy. Each includes:
• an overview of the topic
• an in-depth discussion of the current situation
• a Pro/Con section
• a very useful Chronology
• a bibliography
• an "Issue Tracker" for Related Reports.
Written by experts, all information is accurate and trustworthy. For help with CQ Researcher or any library resource, just ask at the Reference Desk!

Looking for Educational Institutions Around the World???

At the ISU Reference Desk I found an interesting directory called The World of Learning: 2005. This two-volume reference book includes entries of each country in the world with lists of their academic, research, and art institutions. It also contains contact information for each of these institutions as well as for learned societies. Alongside the contact information for the various universities, this book also names the professors who teach and research at the university in question.

Since the publisher relies on each institution to complete a form each time it updates the information, not all of the university entries include a full listing of faculty, but they do name at least the principal leaders, number of students, number of teachers, their librarians, and the names of their journal publications. A brief description of the university explains when it was founded and any name changes it has undergone.

This resource identifies international institutions as well as institutions within the United States. Most entries contain email and internet addresses next to the telephone number and physical address.

I suspect a resource like this would be useful for researchers and students who intend to study abroad. Researchers could contact the pertinent institutions in the country where they will travel and ask if they have any archives or resources that would be useful for their research. Students could learn quite a bit by going to such an institution to see how things differ from their own institution. Graduate students looking for programs could also learn about an institution's programs. It's a good faculty directory.

Partnering with Writing Centers and Teachable Moments

Recently I read two good articles in The Reference Librarian. The first one discussed the issue of teachable moments, looking for times when patrons might be willing to receive more information. Susan Avery notes that these "moments" cannot be planned or "anticipate[d]," are "dependent on the readiness of the recipient," and are "serendipitous." Librarians can give more help than required; we can share our expertise of the many information tools we encounter on a regular basis. Of course, Avery does acknowledge that librarians should be "sensitive to the needs of the patron." Frankly, some individuals could care less about conducting a database search more efficiently as they have other priorities and demands on their time. Therefore, librarians must make their own judgment calls, paying attention to receptivity, attitudes, perceived time constraints, information needs, etc. (117).

Along these lines, Avery suggests ideas that can be found in your standard library-science textbook on reference work:
1. Listen.
2. Be patient and flexible.
3. Look for body language cues.
4. Keep it short and to the point.
5. Let the students do the work.
For understanding the different setting in which a librarian might look for a "teachable moment," see the article.

Works Cited
Avery, Susan. "When Opportunity Knocks: Opening the Door Through Teachable Moments." The Reference Librarian 49.2 (2008): 109-18.

Rachel Cooke and Carol Bledsoe promote the idea of including the Writing Center within the campus library. Doing this would "provide opportunities for partnership" (119). This would be more convenient for the students, particularly those involved in the research and writing process. They discuss how librarians and writing tutors could provide help at each others' desks. Librarians could also train the writing tutors to do some basic research, which would benefit many students simultaneously as many tutors are actually students.

Much of the article revolves around five "challenges" encountered by reference librarians and writing tutors alike:
1. Guiding students through the sequence of the writing process (120).
2. Uncertainty about the assignment (121).
3. "The paper is due in an hour" (121).
4. When students request a librarian or writing tutor to do their research or edit their paper (122).
5. Students who say: "I can find everything on Google. I'll just cut and paste." This touches on the quantity and quality of sources as well as proper citation of these sources.

Let me make just one comment about challenge number one. The authors make a good point that librarians and tutors should not assume that the writing process is the same for everyone. Increasingly, college instructors require their students to write a paper without doing research--at least at the outset. Particularly with lower-division students, instructors find that they let the sources do the talking. Having students write their own thoughts first helps them know what they think; then they can analyze and evaluate what the sources say in comparison with their own ideas.

Therefore, once the students has written their own personal idea paper, then the instructor requires them to research in the area of their topic and write a paper that incorporates their own ideas while also considering the ideas of others. I repeat myself here, because this is something I want to remember. The idea seems to promote real learning and connecting it with real life. What do I know about X? Why do I think this way? What do others say about this topic in question? How do my ideas differ from someone else's? Do their ideas expose any gaps in my own logic? Will I change and adjust my own thinking on this? How?

Somewhat reminiscent of Hegel's model, an instructor who follows this kind of assignment encourages students to form a thesis, consider an antithesis, and then synthesize the two. Adopting this approach could facilitate higher orders of thinking for many students, since too often students revert back to their comfort zones of reporting what they find, rather than thinking about what they find in their research. These "comfort zones" hearken back to show-and-tell activities in the early stages of a child's education.

Cooke, Rachel and Carol Bledsoe. "Writing Centers and Libraries: One-Stop Shopping for Better Term Papers." The Reference Librarian 49.2 (2008): 119-27.