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Research Strategies

This workshop focuses on the process of doing research using print and electronic library resources. This includes:

• choosing a research topic
• choosing keywords
• identifying appropriate library resources for the topic
• searching using Boolean terms (and, or, not)
• revising the research question
• keeping track of search information and collecting bibliographic data

Searching Online Catalogs

This workshop covers basic and advanced searching in online library catalogs, focusing on:

• keyword vs. subject heading searching
• refining searches
• understanding call numbers
• collecting bibliographic data

Locating Journal & Newspaper Articles

This workshop introduces the library's print and electronic resources and gives hands-on experience in searching those resources. Topics covered include:

• identifying appropriate databases for the topic
• the basics of searching online article databases
• searching the ProQuest database
• collecting articles and bibliographic data

Academic Research on the Web

This workshop focuses on:

• advanced web searching techniques
• comparisons of web searching tools such as search engines, subject directories, gateways, etc.
• search tools for academic research

Critical Evaluation of Web Resources

This workshop focuses on strategies for evaluating web sites including:

• developing evaluation criteria
• learning to read URLs
• evaluating hit lists
• evaluating web cites based on specific criteria: authority, currency, point of view, accuracy, coverage

Improving Library Research

This workshop focuses on:

• identifying different types and sources of information
• identifying scholarly (peer-reviewed/refereed) journals vs. popular magazines
• evaluating search results for timeliness, usefulness, authority, etc.

Government Resources

This workshop:

• introduces both print and electronic resources for federal, state, and local government information
• discusses government web sites as sources of statistics
• provides hands-on experience with using library databases (such as CQ Researcher) and web sites (such as FirstGov).

Citing Sources

In this workshop students will discuss and work on issues of ethical and legal use of information such as: 

• to cite or not to cite; what is common knowledge?
• paraphrasing and quoting correctly
• how citations work
• decoding bibliographic information
• how to use a style guide to put the works cited page together