Week 11 – Wrap up

When I started the MARVELous Maine Invitational I thought I was just doing it so I could enter into a raffle for an iPad. Don’t get me wrong, I still want to win an iPad, but I’m so glad I took part. As a librarian who has been around electronic resources for years, you kind of start to think you know everything there is to know about finding info for your customers. Then you take an online tutorial and rediscover forgotten methods or learn the ins and outs of a database you might have ignored.

Probably the biggest take-away for me from this program was the consumer health resources. I was just as guilty as the other guy for looking up health info on the internet. But delving into these resources showed me how easy and useful they are, and how much information they hold for the every-day reader. And, of course, as a teen librarian I found the teen-related resources super helpful – whether it’s the crafts database or Novelist or where to find sample SAT tests.

I plan on having a group of our teen volunteers start making informational “ads” about the resources in print, online graphics, and even podcasts and video. With a teen target audience, these teen-created ads should have a decent impact in encouraging them to use the library resources.

I hope everybody had the same fun I had. What a workout – we’re all informationally ripped and ready to play!

Week 10: Ebscohost

I’ve been feeling the learn for 10 weeks, and now we’re getting to the part where I felt like I was pretty knowledgeable to start. It turns out, there’s always something to learn:

EbscoHost Databases…

1. Using Academic Search complete, I found a plethora of journal titles available. In a past life I was a serials librarian at an academic library, so I checked to see if some of my favorite titles were available, like Music Education Research – yup!

2. I searched “foods with zinc” and resulted in 484 titles. But only 17 were full text, peer-reviewed, and with references. While a limited selection, I did enjoy finding not one, but two from the journal, British Poultry Science. While I couldn’t find a way to narrow by language from the Basic Search results, I was pleased to note that the Turkish articles included English translations.

Ebsco eBooks…

1. Since much of my blog has been an exercise in creative writing, I decided to search for ebooks on that subject and found some really great resources, some that I can even share at the next meeting of our library’s teen writers group. I would like to note that the basic search did not default to text only as indicated in the assignment.

2. An initial search of Constitution Day produced a lot of information on many countries throughout the world, plus a few random returns like Crime Scene Investigation. But I had more luck using the visual search which offered the subject headings to help me understand what I was seeing in my results. When I switched my search to “Constitution and United States” I really started to get some good resources.

3. I got some good results for searching Nebraska in the publisher box, a search I never would have thought of myself. If someone is well-versed in what publishers like to put out, that can be helpful – but there are few of us who are ready-on-the-spot with publisher information.

Another workout complete!

 

Week 9: Learning Express

This resource takes “Feel the Learn” literally. And there’s learning here for all levels. I was impressed they even have sample tests for state middle school exams. For my testing experience, I decided to try the culinary arts exam. And I proved something anyone who has had dinner at my house already knew – I can’t cook. But now I have statistics proving I can’t cook. I actually enjoyed the test, the format was straight forward, it was easy to find and load, and the exam allows you to go through afterwards and see which answers you got wrong so you can use it as a study guide.

After that self-esteem boost, I browsed through the job search info and thought the e-book interview tips were interesting. I decided to try another practice test and clicked on the applied math – only to figure out that meant word problems, the one thing I’m worse at than cooking. Regardless, I can see how this is a helpful resource for folks looking to re-enter the workforce or change their career paths. The one caveat I have is that many of the people coming into the library to work on their resumes and job skills aren’t comfortable using the computer and are not interested in setting up an account to learn online.

I then checked out “reading” as a skill search and found lots of tests, courses and ebooks to keep me busy. I sampled “Reading in 15 minutes” e-book. I think it important to note that the ebooks open as PDFs, so navigation is quite a bit more clunky than navigating a Kindle or other e-book that customers may be used to using. However, it downloaded easily, included the table of contents, and was free – all good things.

Feelin’ the Learn-ing Express!

Week 8: Genealogy Resources

I might be one of the few people around who haven’t “always wanted to research my family.” But I’m usually fascinated when I Google my own name and find out everything the world can know about me. And I was just as fascinated to search myself in Ancestry. First I searched my married  name and on the second page of listings I found myself a few years back (and 2 states ago). When I searched my maiden name, I was the first on the result list and it tracked me through 3 pre-married residences before losing me when I changed my name. I only appeared in city telephone listing and didn’t find my marriage license.

Cooler than searching myself, though, was finding my grandfather listed as a 10-year-old in the 1930 census, and his birth listed as 0 in 1920. I learned my great-grandfather was born in Canada (a surprise to me!) and my great-grandmother was born in Norway. And I found my great-grandfather’s passenger listing from Nova Scotia to Boston and his U.S. Naturalization record.

Finally I searched maps and pictures for Maine. I’m not sure I approached this right, since I couldn’t locate an actual tab for this search, I used the advanced search and deselected all the other options except maps and pictures. But I still got results in the form of pictures of soldiers, baseball players, ships, and more. It’s a neat sampling of Maine’s history – I can spend hours looking at historic photos (and have!).

In an ideal world this would be accessible from any internet connection, but considering the depth of the holdings, it’s more than worth the trip to the library. Plus, any interested amateur genealogists would have the opportunity to visit with their friendly neighborhood librarian, and who could pass that up!

Week 7: Consumer Health Resources

So, here we are in Week 7! This time the workout is focused on health resources. This is as close to a manual as the human body can get!

1. Health Source Consumer Edition: I thought it was silly to have to click on the list of publications and see what’s offered, but then I realized that with such a wide variety you can really target research to an intended audience – and I had no idea how many choices there were! AARP, alcoholism, arthritis, asthma – and that’s just a sampling of the 2 pages of A’s! I decided to search for ADHD (since I feel like I’ve been behaving this way every time I start to dig around in one of these resources) and at first I was disappointed in the results. I found a lot of academic journals titled with medicinal names that I could barely pronounce, let alone read. BUT, when I advanced to page 2, I found a great article from Health that broke down what’s normal vs. what’s more likely to be ADHD behavior. And, interestingly, suggested chewing gum to help keep focused. Happily, I discovered my jumping from topic-to-topic in this research is perfectly normal (and, in fact, I’ve heard from many of you that you’re doing it too!).

2. MedlinePlus: It looks like people are frequently searching in MedlinePlus for topics like cancer, diabetes, polio (surprisingly), and vitamin D. I think this resource is easy to use with the tabs breaking out topics from health to drugs, and even videos and other tools. I searched for the antihistamine Loratadine (yes, I’m allergic to dust and work in a library) and found common uses, forms, precautions, and side effects. This is really helpful, especially for those taking multiple medications or who are prescribed something new. MedlinePlus proved to be much more user-friendly for the average person looking for information about ADHD, understanding what it is, how to live with it, and how it affects different ages differently. The fact that the video offered a transcript for those who didn’t want to sit through the entire thing was super helpful, too. I think this breakdown is fantastic and would steer people to this resource first if they’re looking for information about themselves or loved ones, and steer them toward Health Source if they’re doing more academic research.

This week’s learning exercise surprised me. I thought I would prefer to use the Health Source for pretty much any information (especially since it’s on the Marvel page), and wouldn’t need MedlinePlus which I basically viewed as a duplicate resource – but having the opportunity to compare the two, I see very definite reasons to keep both bookmarked!

Week 6: Business Resources

It turns out we have a CRAZY amount of business resources in Marvel! And this assignment was pretty hefty, but I’ve been working out and I think I’m ready for a learning marathon…

1. Business Source Complete. I searched for info on FM radio and after limiting it to full text found journal articles, reports, and periodicals including images and PDFs of the articles. Using the visual search confused me at first, but I could see how it would be helpful for people who are accustomed to using the “cloud” for online activities.

2. EconLit. I searched for small business resources and got plenty here! I especially liked the option in the left-hand column to narrow by subject: size, new firms, financing, etc. When I didn’t see anything to narrow for the EPA, I used the advanced search to add this topic. EconLit suggested using SmartSearch to look for the keywords, and I got a few hits. Changing to EPA and small business found a different article. Still, I felt as though there should be more than I was finding… hmmm. Might have to play around with that a bit more. Tax policy and small business found many more resources.

3. Regional Business News. Maybe it was because we just had Halloween, but decided to search Hershey and got 3,637 results! I would definitely want to narrow by subject or resource when searching national companies. I decided to do a more local search on LL Bean and found news articles and government documents on everything from a slipper recall to the role outdoor recreation plays in the economy.

4. Value Line. I used the public library link to explore the most recent issue, which to my happy surprise was completely up-to-date. It offered ratings and reports, plus opinions, just like they appear in the printed version. The Investment Education link at the top of the page will be helpful for people just learning about investments and what they should be doing. You can look up information by industry or company, so I chose Home Depot since I’ve been spending a lot of money there lately while I fix up my house. I found a custom report including business profile, company commentary, performance chart – and lots more charts, graphs, and number-type-things. I’ll be feeling the learn with this again later!

5. Wall Street Journal. Searching small business and health care resulted in tons of articles – but the limiters were interesting including political parties (appropriate for my search on election day!), companies, dates, etc. I think a small business owner would definitely be interested in staying on top of the changes in this topic, so the alerts and RSS feed would be handy.

Business is good at the library!

Week 5: Novelist Plus

I was psyched when I saw this one on the list because it’s one of the Marvel! options that I use pretty frequently. I figured it could just sit down and answer the questions without having to do any actual searching. But it turns out, I still had some fun things to learn about NoveList:

1. Searching series is easy, and a great way to figure out what’s next (especially since that can be a bit confusing in our catalog).Being a teen librarian, I spend most of my time trying to track down parts of series, so this is a lifesaver. What I never noticed, though, was the option to change the view. When you have a list of series titles on the screen, putting it into grid view creates a visual list that edits out all the other info you don’t necessarily need right them, and really appeals to the graphically-oriented teens.

2. Read-alikes are my second favorite use for Novelist. I’m often faced with a parent trying to pick out a book for a kid who isn’t present, and being able to search based on other books they’ve read is a huge plus. Being able to show them how they (or, even better, their teen) can figure this out from home, is even better. But, just having learned how to switch to a grid view, I found that the read-alikes option isn’t visible until you change it back to detailed.

3. Now for the part I really was surprised about – all this time I’ve been using Novelist, and I never once paid any attention to the links in the right-hand column. Why? I don’t know. Because they’re fabulous! I found book discussion guides (provided I ever get my new teen book club up and running), marketing materials, and – my favorite – display ideas and themes. Loving it! I’m pretty sure the teachers will enjoy the “teaching with books” link complete with Lexiles and current standards.

Novelist Plus was a database I already loved, and now I love it more.

Week 4: Hobbies and Crafts Reference Center

Everybody has a hobby. I, personally, have about 100 hobbies, which meant I had major ADD when reviewing this resource. Our assignment was to pick a subject category and then choose an area I would like to learn about. But I was like a kid in a candy store and found myself clicking on subject after subject after subject. Once I forced myself to settle down, I discovered some interesting things about this reference center.

For one: being able to view the topics that were included in the subject area in the Find box was very helpful in providing search topic ideas, and narrowing a search as well.

Two: I love that you can both get articles on the subject in general, and project ideas with one search. I downloaded one project idea on cake decorating (yes, just one – so far), and thought the download went smoothly and provided good directions. Also, having multimedia results – especially how-to videos – made understanding and following along with project directions so much easier.

Third: I used the Help option to walk me through the process of creating a folder and saving my favorite search results, and searches, in it. Unfortunately, the one thing the Help directions skipped was that I had to create an account first, so customers using this resource in the library who haven’t already logged in might get a bit confused. And I lost my initial search while I was creating an account.

But overall, I loved the Hobbies and Crafts center, and can already feel a bunch of cold winter nights filling up with great projects. Now I have to decide where to begin!

Week 3: Newspapers and Maine Newstand

It’s handy to have current, immediate  access to local newspapers – this week’s lesson topic. While they don’t go back far enough to replace microfilm archives, this is definitely the easiest way to locate current information. A simple search in the Maine Newstand for “Dempsey Challenge” resulted in 290 results. When I applied full text limitations and narrowed the search to 2012 within the article, I was down to 20 articles and ready to work on a project. The most convenient aspect is the ability to save a search. You do need to create a Research Account, but having your recent search at your fingertips is worth trying to remember yet another login. I recently had a customer in looking for an obituary for her cousin which I had a hard time locating – I should have tried this first rather than a general Internet search.

While still flexing my learning muscles, I took a quick peek at some of my cohort’s learning blogs. I read through a handful (wow, there are a lot of blogs to choose from!) and loved Words from Windham’s outside-the-box thinking about how to incorporate Marvel into summer reading. In the mean time, I’ve been showing Marvel to the 6th grade classes that are coming to tour the library. While I lose some of them when I use the word “databases,” they perk up a bit when we search their chosen subject and they find out they can get the information they need from anywhere at any time. Maybe clicking on some of the videos in Britannic will energize them even more…

Yup, I’m feelin’ the learn now!

Week 2: Brittanica

I aced Week 1 by creating this blog, so now it’s on to Week 2 and the Britannica online encyclopedia. Since I’m at a public library, I searched the public library edition and LOVED what I found. Here goes:

This week’s discovery exercise asked us to search for information on a current event, so I decided to stretch my muscles in a search for info on the space shuttle program. Results found not only space shuttle info, but info on other related topics that might not have occurred to the researcher including space debris, the Canadian Space Agency, and SpaceX – a commercial space flight company. The Content Sources in the left-hand column found more via media and website sources, including How Stuff Works. Although, surprising, it didn’t come up with any primary source data. After clicking into one of the encyclopedia articles I used the translator to switch languages – but I discovered that the first switch was rapid and complete while switching to anything after that or even trying to switch back to English was a slow load that hung up my computer. But I did really like the citation exporter that offered citations in multiple formats. The Biographies and Year in Review links at the top of the main page were fun, and would be nice for a current events project or classroom assignment.

Overall, I found the online version of Brittanica to be as useful as the print, and it should be used in the same manner. It’s good for quick facts, but anything more in-depth may take another source.

Phew, what a workout. I’m already feelin’ the learn.