Lesson 7

I am quite familiar with WorldCat since I used it regularly to do interlibrary loans for several years.  For this lesson I looked up the book, "Cuddly Crochet" by Stacey Trock.  There are 191 libraries that own this, with Anchorage Public Library in Alaska being the first listed.  The LC number given is TT825, and the Dewey numbers are 746.43/4041 or 746.43.  I found two other records in WorldCat linked to this author (although I believe they are the same book with different publication years).  When I clicked on the subject heading "soft toy making", I got 1234 results in various formats.  When I tried the subject heading, "crocheting -- patterns" the result was 4076 total hits.  These results can be limited by format using the tabs at the top.

In the OAIster database (something I have not used before), I had 764 results for my subject search of  "South Dakota".  I clicked on the link for "Flax Cropping in Mixture With Wheat, Oats, and Barley."  When I then clicked on the "Access" link, I could further click to view each page of this 47 page document.  This would be something for serious researchers to use.  We don't get a lot of requests for the type of information that seems to be in OAIster, but it is good to know it is available.

When looking at other participants' blogs. I noticed that some had difficulty accessing articles on OAIster either because the article just didn't open or else you had to log in to get access to it.  I looked at a couple documents they had also looked at and got the same results.  I guess I just happened to pick one of the right ones initially.  I think everyone at our library is pretty familiar with how to search and use WorldCat since we submit our interlibrary loan requests through it.

Lesson 6

In the EBooks on EbscoHost, I typed in the term "cooking."  There were 121 hits.  I scrolled through the list and looked at one called, "Cooking the Australian Way."  There is a handy Table of Contents listing to the left of the screen.  I tried to email or print a page from this, but the publisher had blocked access to doing so.  So, I scrolled further through the list of 121 hits, and found one titled "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Sewing."  It doesn't really have anything to do with cooking, but since the term "cooking" was used a couple times in the text, it was in my results list.  I looked at this book and found I was able to both email and print a couple pages from the text.  There is a limit of 60 pages, but this would be a handy tool for someone doing research and wanting to be able to reference some specific pages later.

When I searched "constitution and United States," these are some of the results I had:

     Companion to the United States Constitution and Its Amendments Vile, John R. 3rd ed. Greenwood Publishing Group. 2001. eBook. 326p.
     Representing Popular Sovereignty : The Constitution in American Political Culture Levin, Daniel Lessard. In: SUNY Series, American Constitutionalism. State University of New York Press. 1999. eBook. 289p. 
     Illustrated Dictionary of Constitutional Concepts  Maddex, Robert L. Congressional Quarterly Press. 1996. eBook. 349p. 
     Our Elusive Constitution : Silences, Paradoxes, Priorities  Hoffman, Daniel N. In: SUNY Series in American Constitutionalism. State University of New York Press. 1997. eBook. 299p.

A quick browsing of the results list impresses me with the thought that these resources would be appropriate for upper-level students, but certainly not for elementary age students.

As I expected, searching for the term "Oklahoma" in the Publisher field of the Advanced search yielded results with the term "Oklahoma" somewhere in the Publisher name information. A quick spot-check of the results list makes it appear they are all from the University of Oklahoma Press.

Lesson 5

1.  I looked at the Title List in the Gale Virtual Reference Library and took a look at the "Encyclopedia of Science."  Then I used the search box to look up the "echidna" since I had looked at this critter in the World Book section of this Challenge.  The information given in the Gale encyclopedia is more detailed than what is in World Book, so this could be another avenue of reference for a student doing a report.  A bonus is that at the bottom of the article is a section titled, "View other articles linked to these index terms" which directs one to even more information.   I also looked at the "Worldmark Encyclopedia of the States" and looked up South Dakota.  There is a great deal of information in this publication.  Unfortunately, it has a copyright date of 2007, so some sections are a bit out of date.

2.  I looked up the search terms "foods containing zinc" (without the apostrophes).  My search yielded several articles in about five different publications.  I also looked at articles regarding the Huckleberry Finn.  The "Listen" feature is similar to the one in World Book and would be helpful for those whose native language is not English.  The "Related Subjects" column on the left is another source for linking to additional information, and being able to look up words in the Dictionary link at the top is also a helpful tool.   In addition, I tried the "Translate" option for a few different languages.  (There aren't as many language options as in WB.)  It worked for French, Russian, Spanish, etc. and seemed to work partly for Arabic and Japanese.  However, for Chinese and Korean, the characters displayed only as little boxes.   I thought perhaps there was a problem with the settings on my computer, but I checked in World Book Reference, and articles do translate there with the  Chinese and Korean characters.

3.  I looked at the blog posted by "Electronic Resource Challenge 2012."  I'm glad she pointed out the ability to download articles to an MP3 player or eReader.  I had totally missed those tabs when looking at the "Listen"  and "Translate" options.

Lesson 4

I have used Proquest in the past (mostly doing advanced searches) to find information for library patrons.  Today I did a basic search for the terms "healthy dieting" and had 4601 hits.  I sorted them according to date, and found there were articles posted that were from as recent as yesterday.  The search yielded results on a very wide variety of information about the subject--everything from the cardiovascular risks of consuming high fructose syrup to how Kate and Pippa Middleton stay slim and trim to how to look "7 years younger"--and those were just from the first couple of pages in my list of hits.  Obviously, I could narrow the search by narrowing my search terms.  I also could narrow the results list by choosing to view articles from particular types of publications (scholarly journals, magazines, etc.) or by time frame or by looking only at a particular publication's articles, etc.  I think the "Preview" feature is very beneficial if you just want a quick glance of what an article is about.

I commented on Librarian 2's post about bonds.

Under the Publications tab, I typed in the term "Library" to come up with all the journals that have "Library" in the title.  It showed 20 titles.  I scrolled through the list and read an interesting article in the Jan. 2012 issue of "School Library Journal."  It's great having these articles in full-text since our library has canceled several periodical subscriptions over the recent years because of rising costs.  I also took a quick look through some of the other publications listed (even though they are not in my "profession").  I was impressed by the number and variety of publications with full-text articles available.  I just wish there were more pictures!