Intro to Library Research (09-130) not offered Fall 2009

Introduction to Library Research (09-130) will not be offered Fall 2009 or Spring 2010. Instead, librarians will be developing learning modules with an assessment piece which may be adopted by faculty for use in their upper and lower level courses.

Faculty who are interested in using and/or developing information literacy learning modules for their courses are encouraged to contact one of the librarians who will be working on this project for more information:

Linda Neyer, Health Sciences/Science Librarian, x4801, lneyer@bloomu.edu
Michael Coffta, Business Librarian, x4124, mcoffta@bloomu.edu
Darla Bressler, Education Librarian, x4656, dbressle@bloomu.edu
David Magolis, Social Sciences Librarian, x4921, dmagolis@bloomu.edu
Katie Yelinek, Gov’t Documents, x4228, kyelinek@bloomu.edu

Following is a list of topics that have been taught in the 1-credit “Intro to Library Research” in the past:

1. Library Research and Academic Integrity
   Introduction – Value of library research
   Academic Integrity - Bloomsburg University's Academic Integrity Policy
2. Introduction to media and formats (including print and electronic)
   Periodicals (scholarly, popular, trade, newspapers, other)
   Primary vs. secondary sources
   Evaluating sources
3. Topic Formation
   Selecting a topic
   Narrowing a topic
   Writing a thesis statement
4. Search Strategies
   Controlled vocabulary vs. natural language
   Using natural language
   Using Boolean operators
   Truncation and wildcards
5. Online Catalog Searching
   Library Collections
   Using the Andruss Library catalog
   Finding Course Reserve materials
   Setting search limits
   Printing, saving, and emailing search results
   Other catalogs
6. Database Searching
   What is a database?
   Searching the ‘Periodical Title List’
   Research databases (interdisciplinary vs. discipline-specific)
   Discipline-specific modules (identifying and using essential databases, print sources, and Web sites)
7. Citation Guides
   Citing sources - general information
   Reading a citation
   APA Style
   MLA Style
   Using bibliographic management software, e.g., RefWorks
8. Evaluating Internet Sites
   Criteria for evaluating Web sites
   Conspicuous bias
   Authoritative collections of Web sites
   Using site maps and other navigation tools
9. Assessment:
   Quizzes for each learning unit
   15-item annotated bibliography researching a pre-approved topic

Sunshine Week Essay Contest Winners

Congratulations to the winners of the 2009 Sunshine Week Essay contest!

In the university student category...

• First prize: Marissa Eby, Junior Accounting Major
• Second prize: Tarah Moore, Senior Computer Forensics Major
• Third prize: Robert Mark, Junior Finance Major

No prizes were awarded in the high school student category, due to a lack of entries. However, the judges awarded an honorarium to the one student who entered. Congratulations to Brandon Stanton from Honesdale High School.

Look for the first prize essay to be published in the Press Enterprise during Sunshine Week, March 15-21. For more information, go to http://library.bloomu.edu/pages/govinfo/sunshine.html.

Download and listen to full-text articles on your MP3 player

One of the Library's full-text database providers, Wilson Web, is offering a new text-to-audio converter. Called 'ReadSpeaker', it offers “text-to-speech” for full-text HTML articles. You can listen to these articles online or download them to your computer or MP3 player and listen to them later.

If you're an auditory learner, or are learning English as a second language, or just like to multitask, check out this new feature in the the following library databases:

• Applied Science & Technology Full Text
• Art Full Text
• Education Full Text
• Library Literature & Information Science Full Text
  

Get Creative!

View this video to learn about Creative Commons, a great resource for finding photographs, illustrations, music, video, and other education resources that you can use (either as a student or as a faculty member) without permission or fees. It answers the question, "Is it okay for me to use this photograph/article/figure/etc in my classroom/article/Web site/etc?" If it's in Creative Commons, the answer is yes! (Search Creative Commons for resources here.)

The Googlization of Everything

Siva Vaidhyanathan, cultural historian and media scholar at the University of Virginia, is writing a new book titled The Googlization of Everything: How One Company is Disrupting Culture, Commerce, and Community... And Why We Should Worry, and he maintains a blog with the same name. On his blog, he recently gave a great example of where uncritical use of Internet search engines can lead. He told the story about a news reporter who had searched for the words "bankruptcy 2008" in Google and found a news article in the Google News results that (long story short) was labeled as having happened in 2008 but which had actually happened in 2002. The company in question, an airline, had successfully reorganized after the 2002 bankruptcy, but this fact was apparently unknown to the reporter because he wrote an erroneous article about the airline that damaged the company financially.

Siva noted all the problems leading up to this disastrous ending:

This anecdote teaches us some valuable lessons about our alarming dependence on Google... We live in a world flooded with data. We live lives devoted to maximum speed and dexterity, rather than deliberation and wisdom. Many of our systems, not least electronic journalism, are biased toward the new and the now. And even after living intimately with networked computers for almost two decades we lack a widespread understanding of what such systems can and cannot do, or even how they work. We trust them with far too much that is dear to us and fail to master their limits and problems.

Read the full post here.

New Look for ILLiad

ILLiad (Andruss Library's online Interlibrary Loan request system) has a new look this Spring.

We hope this new design will be easier to use.

Interlibrary Loan services are available to current BU students, faculty, and staff. Use your library card number to logon to ILLiad at: http://illiad.bloomu.edu

Please contact Andrea Schwartz at ill@bloomu.edu or (570) 389-4218 with any questions, problems, or concerns.

Sunshine Week Essay Contest

Win Prizes! Get Published!

The Andruss Library Government Documents Unit is sponsoring an essay contest in honor of Sunshine Week. Write 600-700 words on the following:

Before and after the November 2008 election, there were calls for the new president to make Freedom of Information a top priority in the new administration. "Over the past several years, the release and disclosure of government information, whether it be health, safety, environmental, financial, or national security information, has taken a backseat to misguided homeland security policies and efforts to protect special interests,” one critic claims.

Pretend that you are advising the new president. What government information would you make available? How would you balance national security against an open government? Please address both questions in your essay.

First Prize: $250 and your essay published

Deadline: February 9, 2009

For complete rules and more information:
http://library.bloomu.edu/pages/govinfo/sunshine.html