Teacher as Researcher
Library Instruction for ED 690, Spring 2012
Photo by Steven De Polo
Objectives
Develop an awareness of the different library resources available for education research
Generate search terms and organize your search strategy
Become familiar with basic and advanced search features in databases in order to search the journal literature
Library Research Guide• Research guides will help you
choose encyclopedias, databases, journals, and other resources for your education research
• Start at the Library Homepage– http://www.pace.edu/library
• Under “Library Services” click on Research Guides– Choose Education from the Subject
list – Search for or scroll to: “Teacher as
Researcher: Action Research”
Or access the guide directly at: libguides.pace.edu/ActionResearch
Using the Pace Library Catalog• The Pace Library Catalog lists the books, e-books, movies and
other materials owned by the Pace Library
– There are two ways to search the catalog
Classic catalog
Encore
Tips for using Encore to search the catalog
• Start with a broad search• Use the tags on the right to narrow your search • While you’re browsing, you can click on the “Add to List” link to keep track of items you were interested in
• When you find a book that looks interesting, look at the record and click on the relevant subject heading to find more books and materials on that subject
• Use the Request It button to get books from other Pace campuses • Takes 1-2 business days. You will get an e-mail when the book arrives and it
can be picked up at the circulation desk.
• Use the Connect NY button to find resources from other universities • Takes 3-5 business days. You will get an e-mail when the book arrives and it
can be picked up at the circulation desk.
• When you’re in Connect NY (it will open in another tab or window) use the WorldCat link to find books available through InterLibrary Loan
Organizing your search strategy• Sample question: • What factors affect the intrinsic motivation of
socioeconomically challenged middle-school students?
• Step 1: eliminate extraneous words• Step 2: pull out key words
Concept A Concept B Concept C
intrinsic motivation socioeconomically challenged
middle-school students
Organizing your search strategy, cont.
• Step 3: brainstorm synonyms for your key words – Note: you may continue to add synonyms and
subject headings as you search
Using Databases to find Articles
From the library home page, click on Databases: Find an Article
Recommended Databases:Education OtherERIC PsycInfoEducation Abstracts Academic SearchProfessional Development Premier Collection Jstor
Boolean Operators
Boolean Operators & Search Tips
• Use “OR” to connect related or synonymous terms within a single search box, this widens your search
• Parentheses: be sure to group OR terms within parentheses, eg. (“special education” OR “special needs”)
• Use “AND” to narrow search results by combining key concepts – Eg. motivation AND “socioeconomically challenged” AND “middle
school” • Asterisk: retrieves all alternate endings, eg. disab* retrieves disability,
disabled, disabilities, etc. • Quotation marks retrieves that exact phrase, eg. “social media”
Limiting your search
• In Ebsco databases (eg. ERIC and PsycInfo) you can limit your search in 2 ways
From the Advanced After getting Search screen a set of
results
Finding Subject headings in PsycInfo
• To review How and Why to use the Thesaurus in PsycInfo, view this video: – http://tinyurl.com/axvbybr
Finding Full-Text Documents In ERIC, if it is a book, search for the book title in the catalog
to see if the book is available from Pace or Connect NY
For articles (in all databases) use the Search for Article button
Finding Full-Text Documents After clicking Search for Article, if you see:
Click on the
“Article” link
Click on the “ILLiad” link to make
an ILL request
Note: you need a library barcode to create an
InterLibrary Loan account
To get more help • The library home page:
www.pace.edu/library• Use the Ask-a-Librarian
link • Under “Library
Services” – Video tutorials– How do I? – Research Guides
• E-mail Jennifer! [email protected]
• Stop by or call the reference desk
(the desk under the big Information sign in the middle of the library)
• (212) 346-1331
Quiz Time!
tinyurl.com/ed690mcdermott
Photo by Alberto G.