LL ED 498B - Open Institute

LIBRARY GUIDE

Contact: Judy Sandt, Reference Librarian
Location: PSLV Library
Email: jsandt@psu.edu

finding books

The CAT is Penn State's online catalog of over 4 million volumes, as well as videos, audio cds, maps, musical scores, dissertations, newspapers, journals, and more.

Go to the CAT

Search Tips:

To find a book on a topic, do a Keyword Search. Enter a word or phrase in the search box. You may want to combine terms using AND, OR, and NOT. To identify appropriate subject terms, find a relevant book by doing a keyword search, then check its subject terms on the detail screen.

To find a book when you know the title or author, use the Browse Search. Enter the title or author (type last name first), choose what library or libraries you want to search, then click the appropriate search type at the bottom.

Students may borrow books from any Penn State campus. To search all Penn State libraries, choose ALL from the In Library menu. To order books from other campuses, use the I Want It button at the top of every detail page.

Quick Guide to the CAT

Books Elsewhere:

If you need a book not owned by Penn State Libraries, it may be available from another library. Check the following resources:

• WorldCat, with 38 million items in libraries around the world. Register with Illiad, and then order books as you search WorldCat
• The VEL, a catalog of all CIC (Big 10) universities' library holdings
• RLG (RLIN), a union catalog of over 150 research libraries
• (PALCI), a consortium of PA academic libraries
  Note: Books requested from other institutions may take longer to arrive and have shorter loan periods.

Libraries Borrowing Policies:
Loan periods are usually four weeks but books can be recalled for another user. Respond promptly to library notices to avoid fines. For more information see the University Libraries Lending Code.

finding articles

Search Tips:
Finding the best articles on your topic requires a number of steps.

• Select a source from the E-Resource List or the list below
• Enter and combine terms appropriate to your topic
• Look at the best references you retrieve and determine the subject terms used for those articles. Then revise your search using these new terms.
• Email, print, or make note of all pertinent information (called the 'citation') including the journal title, volume, date, and page numbers.
• Explore other databases and subject terms (which vary between databases) for more information.

For a customized search strategy, email a reference librarian and include your topic, course title, and any other relevant information.

Suggested E-Resources:

Education Databases

• Education Abstracts Full Text [Wilson] covers over 625 periodicals, with indexing from 1983, and full text for many since 1994.
  
• ERIC Database (Educational Resources Information Center) is the world's largest source of education information, containing over one million abstracts on education research and practice. ERIC covers two types of literature:

  Journals (in CIJE- Current Index to Journals in Education, 1969-) Scholarly, professional and practitioner journals.

  Documents (in RIE- Resources in Education, 1966-). Non-journal literature, such as full text curriculum guides, theses, conference papers, standards, reports, etc. Not peer-reviewed.
  

• Ethnic NewsWatch (ENW) is a comprehensive full text database of the newspapers, magazines and journals of the ethnic, minority and native press. Continuously growing since 1991, with archival material back to 1985, Ethnic NewsWatch is now a collection of more than 470,000 full-text articles from over 200 publications. Searchable in both English and Spanish, with titles in both languages and more than 100,000 articles in Spanish, ENW offers in-depth coverage of a wide range of current and retrospective topics easily accessed using free text and fielded searching. An average of 7,500 new articles is added each month.
  
• Kraus Curriculum Development Library(KCDL)Online is a searchable database of collections of curriculum guides, lesson plans, frameworks, standards, and teaching practices for PreK-12, and Adult Basic Education. Information in the database covers all disciplines, subjects, and grade levels found in PreK through 12th grade education and Adult Basic Education.
  
• Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts covers all aspects of the study of language, including phonetics, phonology, morpohology, syntax and semantics, hearing and speech pathology, philosophy of language, and applied linguistics. It indexes journals in the field from 1973-present, and is updated monthly. 1246 journals are currently monitored for inclusion in the database.
  
•  Professional Development Collection (Education) is designed for professional educators and librarians, provides a highly specialized collection of over 515 full text journals, including nearly 350 peer-reviewed titles, with full text dating as far back as 1965. It also provides full text for 167 education pamphlets, a searchable images database, and will soon contain full text for scholarly monographs. A title list can be seen at http://www.epnet.com/titlelists/pdf/tf.pdf .

Get the full text of articles:

• Once you find the citation, you may find the full text linked from the e-resource.
• If it is not available directly from the e-resource, check to see if Penn State has access to the electronic version elsewhere by searching for the title of the journal or newspaper (not the title of the article in the e-journals list
• To order an article not available in any of our e-resources use Illiad and view it online usually within 36 hours.

Other education related e-resources:

Click on for a description of the E-Resource.
E-Resources marked with an have full text.
E-Resources marked with an are Article/Index resources.