Wrap Up

I found several items interesting this year.  I have students interested in languages yet they are not taught in middle school.  Mango gives them the opportunity to explore several languages and decide which one they might prefer in high school.  I also liked the Chilton library for auto repair.  I often have 8^th grade boys who are fixing up an old car to get ready for driving in high school.  This would be a great resource for them.  Using Proquest was good practice for me and will need to incorporate this database with my 7^th & 8^th grade Edmodo lessons.  With ebooks becoming even more popular in my library, I look forward to sharing those findings as well. I always enjoy sharpening my advanced searching skills and which is the reason I take the challenge.

The electronic challenge is fuel for my library lessons.  I like to collaborate/visit with different teachers so I may link the students current subject matter to the library.  By showing them the connections between their current lessons and databases, it is my hope to help them Google less and use databases more frequently.  I am always on the lookout for new resources I think the teachers might find supportive.

Ancestry Library, Heritage Quest and Sanborn Maps

The first question had me stumped for a little while.  I did not know the name of the sister ship of the Titanic.  So I began my search under the collections tab.  I used the phrase given, “Ship Pictures and Descriptions” and this took me to the Immigration and Travel section.  On the right, I used the filter to find titanic but could not find the sister ship name.  I even searched Titanic sister ship with no results.  Hate to admit it, but I used Google to find the name of the sister ship which is Olympic.  After that I did the original search phrase and then selected Photos & Maps which gave me another search field.  I typed in Olympic and on the new page selected Passenger Ships and Images.  Out of the 3 images in this limiter, the Olympic was shown.  As I looked at the images, all three of them were built by White Star.  Possibly the third ship was another sister ship named, Brittanic.

 

I struggled a bit more with the second question which was to find information on the Hindenburg under Newspapers and Publications.   I started with the collections tab and then selected newspapers and publications.  This is where I became lost.  I dialed a friend and together we worked through my problem (thanks Peggy).  I had to then select, Search entire “Newspapers & Publications” category.  The next page also had me stumped a little.  The keyword box was near the bottom.  I think placing it closer to the first and last names may make it easier to find.  I typed in Hindenburg and searched.  With this I had 436 results.  Looking more closely, I noticed a tab for records and categories.  The records seemed to be photocopied typed subject card index which I think is just an organizational record.  When I selected the categories tab, the results were arranged by newspapers and publications.   I could open an image and view a scanned newspaper.  Within the article the search word was highlighted.  Most of the articles dealt with the person Hindenburg or the Hindenburg line. I needed to figure out how to find the airship. I went back to the search and included the year 1937, the year of the disaster.  I had a lot of results including the obituaries of those who died in that disaster.  My favorite results to look through were the scanned or photographed newspapers.

I began the last search in HeritageQuest by selecting Search PERSI Archive which can “Find information about people and places from this index of over 2.3 million genealogy and local history articles (1800-2009).”  I then chose Places, “Search for information about towns, cities or regions in periodical articles.”  I included the information, South Dakota and McPherson Country and included all types of records.  This netted me 61 results.  I searched the various records types and got 3 biography, 12 history and 1 census.  Not all records had results.  One item in biography, I was interested in, was about Long Lake where grandma lived for many years up until last year.  The other two were promising as well; County homesteaders and Pioneer days, 1884-.  In the history records were several results that are about Russian Germans which is my husbands entire family.  Many useful results.

CAMIO

I needed to find the way people dressed in Charles Dickens’ England (the Victorian Era, 1837-1901).  I began by selecting Costume & Jewelry on the homepage and went to the advanced search and used Victorian and clothing (&fashion).  Most of my results were to do with jewelry.  I used the advanced search and plugged in England, Victorian Era, dress, fashion, and clothing).  I used multiple combinations with no luck.  I even tried working with the dates with no luck.  I could really use some added hints as this is driving me crazy.  I am finding this database hard to navigate.

WorldCat, CAMIO and More

I searched Martin Luther King in the basic search and had over 27,000 results.  I noticed the tab for books and saw over 13,000 results. I selected the book tab and then used the limiters under the tabs and selected juvenile and nonfiction.  After this I was down to 1,271 results and then noticed the English results for 1,134.  I saw the title Martin’s Big Words which is an excellent picture book.  Some may consider the picture book too young for 4 & 5^th graders, but I strongly believe you are never too old to enjoy picture books.  It does show primary school in the records but could be used for discussion and understanding for what they already know.  For this book to be used in Sunday school it should be short enough to get through the book for the hour once a week, in a couple of weeks.  Another possible book for this activity could be, My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr.  by Coretta Scott King.  This book however has 372 pages and is too long for the time available but excerpts could be read from the book.  The detailed records show the number of pages in the books.  When I selected Martin’s Big Words I was able to select “libraries worldwide that own the book”.  I was able to view the libraries in South Dakota that have this item.  I started to select the different libraries and not all of the links to those libraries worked.  Even when I selected Rapid City Public Library, “he file or directory was not found”.  Because I already have the link to Rapid City Public Library, I could search for the book online and hold or just drive down there to retrieve the book.  When finding a library with a working link that had the book, there was the option to request the book through interlibrary loan.

The second question is relevant to my library at this time.  I am always looking to increase the library’s graphic novel collection but want to choose graphic novels that have chapter book beginnings.  I did the advanced search for graphic novels and classics and had 889 results.  As looked through the results not all the results are what I would consider a classic.  Garfield does not fit this categories in my opinion.  Some of the results are just comics.  I tried to do an advanced search and selected “not” comics but still had comics in the results. I do not think there is enough distinction between comic and graphic novel yet. As I looked at the detailed records I noticed that graphic novels is listed in the subjects but only see classic(s) in other areas of the records.  Not sure if this has any bearing on my results.  When I put in “classic” and designated it as a subject, I only received one result and that was as a classic as a genre.  As I looked at the libraries nearby that house some of these graphic novels, it appeared as if very few are owned by SD libraries that in with WorldCat.  I liked that I could see the cover of these graphic novels.  Many had covers I think my middle schoolers would deem to young, and I think they are looking for edgier graphic covers.  One graphic novel I found that I may add to my library is War of the Worlds which is published by Stone Arch Books.  I would normally record the ISBN as I would use this to search my book vendor.

For the third question, I used the advanced search in WorldCat and typed in “My Fair Lady” and “vocal score”.  I had a 148 total results but noticed a tab for scores which had 133 results.  I redid the advance search after I had been pulled away and noticed the second time on the advanced search that I could select musical scores.  I chose the first result

My fair lady :
vocal selection /

Frederick Loewe;  Alan Jay Lerner

The detailed record has the description as 1 vocal score.  The descriptor under subjects labels it as:  Musicals—Excerpts—Vocal scores with piano.  This appeared to be a great match.  The accession number is  OCLC: 2052359.

EBooks on EbscoHost

I first did a search for young adult and literature and came up with 43 results.  I found several eBooks of interest.

100 More Popular Young Adult Authors : Biographical Sketches and Bibliographies

Coretta Scott King Award Books : Using Great Literature with Children and Young Adults

Center Stage : Library Programs That Inspire Middle School Patrons

On Reading Books to Children : Parents and Teacher

As I looked closer at the results their publication dates seemed to range from 1999 to 2004.  So I decided to narrow the search to more recent publication dates as young adult literature has evolved a lot in the last ten years.  I could only narrow the range from 2002 to 2005 and had 14 results after.  The above books remained in the results.  I had hoped for more recent publications.   I returned to the advanced search and tried different search terms.  As I typed in young adult, many options to choose from popped up for selection.  Starting another search I selected the range 2005 to 2014, English and download available with no search term and had 631 results.  When I added fiction as a search term with the previous limiter, I had only 6 results.  None which would interest my middle school students. 

I did search South Dakota and got 123 results.  There were some very interesting titles, a couple of which I already own.  There were several books I think teachers could use as supplement resources but may not be of interest to students.

Tyrannosaurus Sue : The Extraordinary Saga of the Largest, Most Fought Over T. Rex Ever Found

The Rapid City Indian School, 1898-1933

America's National Historic Trails

Bachelor Bess : The Homesteading Letters of Elizabeth Corey, 1909-1919

When looking at any of the results I had the ability to search similar sources through the subjects category.  Farther down the page for each book was a section that highlighted most relevant pages from the book in connection with my search term(s).  I think this database might be a bit much for my students to use.  It takes quite a bit of searching to locate exactly what you are looking for and students do not usually have the patience for this level of researching.

 

For the second question, I typed in fairy tales and had 66 results.  I found some titles with a color listed in each title.  Looking closer I realized that the books were by the same author, Andrew Lang.  The covers of these eBooks did not always show the color that was in the title but described the fairy.    To sort quicker, I used the advanced search for fairy tales and Andrew Lang which netted me 6 results.  Looking at the results, the last book listed was by Andrew Lang but not a fairy tale but a book of poems.  The Blue Fairy book was listed twice.  These two books are the same as I looked at the most relevant pages section, they are just listed with different publication information.

The Violet Fairy Book

The Blue Fairy Book       In public domain. Champaign, Ill. [P.O. Box 2782, Champaign 61825] : Project Gutenberg.

Blue Fairy Book              In public domain. Charlottesville, Va : University of Virginia Library. 1996

The Yellow Fairy Book

The Red Fairy Book

I went back to the original fairy tale search to explore more of the other titles.  I have an 8^th grade teacher who teaches a mythology class that includes fairy tales and thought she might find some the titles helpful.  One item I noticed is that most of the ebooks are at least 10 years old, though because of the topic may not be of great importance.  Many of the 66 results did not focus on what I wanted so I went back to advanced search and searched fairy tales as a subject which yielded 19 results.  This was a cleaner search and I will pass on these results to that teacher.

Gale Virtual Reference Library

Using Gale Virtual Reference Library, I chose Multicultural Studies from the left under subjects.  This seemed the most logical, with the organization seeking holidays around the world.  Once under multicultural studies, I then searched festivals and got 312 results.  I then searched spring festivals and got 20 results.  These seemed to be mostly Asian results and decided I needed to cast a wider net.  I did a search of spring festivals in the entire database and got 157 results but many of these were college blue books.  I decided to back out to the homepage and look through the different categories to see the covers and titles of the books.  I found two possible books under Nation and World, Junior Worldmark Encyclopedia of Foods and Recipes of the World, 2012 and Junior Worldmark Encyclopedia of World Holidays, 2000.  The index of the World Holidays contains a calendar that allows you to see the spring season holidays.  I looked at different countries in the Foods and Recipes of the World and found sections on foods for religious and holiday celebrations.  I also found Junior Worldmark Encyclopedia of World Holidays for several different countries.  When I looked at the different volumes in this encyclopedia there was a section for spring (though one included Halloween with spring).  All these could be very helpful.  Most holidays I found were of religious origin.

In advanced searching I selected “after” and chose the year 2011.  I received 30,616 results which is considerable for recently added information.  I really enjoy viewing the limiters in any database and immediately looked in the left sidebar.  There were many categories under the headings of document type and subjects.  I was pleased with the number of subjects on Native Americans which included: history, culture, religion, reservations, education and cooking.  What I found unusual was that the subjects were not listed in alphabetical order but by the number of results that subject contained.  I selected Native American reservations and received 99 results.  Native American tribes are very diverse.  As I looked through the sources each had the region(s) for the tribe under the title.  Within these 99 results the subject limiters to the left expanded greatly.  I found I could search within these results and used Great Basin trying to narrow results to tribes in our area.  I found it an effective way to narrow searches by regions.