The Information Skills Tutorial
Take the Information Skills Tutorial.
If we could make only one recommendation to our students, it would be to take this tutorial. It steps you through the research process from beginning to end.
- Formulating a research question
- Getting background information with reference books
- Understanding primary versus secondary sources
- Understanding scholarly versus popular sources
- Keywords, boolean operators, and searching in databases
- Evaluating your sources for quality and reliability; critical thinking
- Citing your sources
You can work through the tutorial from beginning to end, or go directly to the specific section that you need.
Research Techniques
- Anatomy of a Scholarly ArticleThis interactive visual shows you how to identify and use the different parts of a scholarly article.
- Books versus JournalsA side-by-side comparison of information from books versus journals:
* how each is useful for research in a different way
* how each of them is created differently and has a different kind/level of information
* how to find them - Creating A Search From Your TopicVideo on basic search strategies for how to construct a viable search that a search tool (or database) will understand.
- Detecting Bad Science and Phony StatisticsDetecting bad science and math can be tricky if your expertise lies in other fields. But this tutorial gives some easy warning signs to watch out for.
- Evaluating Information Sources for Purpose, Perspective, Agenda, and BiasThis section of the Information Skills Tutorial shows you how to decide whether an information resource is
* relevant to your topic
* written by someone with the appropriate expertise and credentials
* recent enough
* objective and trustworthy enough - Find and Narrow Your Topicor view animated tutorial
Explains how to select a topic that's neither too broad nor too narrow to research and write about. - Find Peer-Reviewed ArticlesShows you how to search so that you get only peer reviewed (aka scholarly) articles.
- Find Response and Critique ArticlesHow to find an article that criticizes, rebuts or responds to another article.
- Finding Scholarly (Peer Reviewed) Articles On Your TopicVideo on how to navigate the Empire State College Online Library to locate scholarly/peer-reviewed articles on your topic.
- How to block content farm web sites from your Google search resultsContent farms clutter up your search results with their low-quality, repetitive, mostly plagiarized content. Here's how to get rid of them.
- How To Find Articles
- Identify KeywordsShows you how to come up with keywords to search in library databases, the e-book catalog, even Google.
- Locate Charts, Graphs & Diagrams on EBSCOHost
- Magazines vs. Scholarly Journals
- Commercial Document Delivery Services
- Peer Review in 5 MinutesThis video explains how the peer review process works and why it's the foundation of scholarly communication. It makes clear the difference between scholarly and popular articles.
- Primary or Secondary?This interactive tutorial explains the difference between primary and secondary sources, and how each type plays a different role in research.
- Primary Sources - Making Sense of EvidenceThis set of tutorials explains how primary sources are used in research.
- Primary vs. Secondary SourcesThis page in the Information Skills Tutorial explains the difference between primary, secondary and tertiary sources and how you can tell them apart. It also talks about how they are used differently in research.
- Research Skills
- Search Tips
- Six Phase Approach to ResearchA revised and updated version of the Six Step Approach to Research.
- Turn Your Topic into a Useful SearchThis video shows you how to do a keyword search for your topic in the databases.
- Using AND, OR & NOT to Combine Keywordsor view print version
This video explains how to use Boolean Operators (AND, OR, NOT) for powerful, precise database searching. - How To Find Journals
- Virtual Tour of the Online Library
- Wikipedia: Beneath the SurfaceFind out how Wikipedia works & how to evaluate information in it.
Your Librarians |
 Your Librarians |
Using the Library with Mobile Devices
Is the Online Library compatible with my iPad? Kindle? Droid Phone? Blackberry? Other mobile device?
The answer is, it depends on your device and the library resource.
For information about each library database and e-book collection and how they work with mobile devices as well as information on available apps and how to read articles or e-books on your device, please visit http://www.esc.edu/library-mobile
Loading...
