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INFORMATION LITERACY

INFORMATION LITERACY. TOOLS, STRATEGIES & TECHNIQUES OF SEARCHING. Tools, strategies & techniques of searching. Learning Objectives Tools: understand how manual catalogue is used; understand how OPAC is used How Boolean logic and truncation are used for searching Techniques of searching.

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INFORMATION LITERACY

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  1. INFORMATION LITERACY TOOLS, STRATEGIES & TECHNIQUES OF SEARCHING

  2. Tools, strategies & techniques of searching Learning Objectives • Tools: understand how manual catalogue is used; understand how OPAC is used • How Boolean logic and truncation are used for searching • Techniques of searching

  3. Using library tools • Library resources go through review process • Library resources are free or discounted for your use • Library resources are organized • Library resources are meant to be kept permanently • Library resources come with personal assistance.

  4. LIBRARY TOOLS FOR SEARCHING Library Catalogue • list materials held in collection of one library • list titles owned by a library, and in some cases, those they have access to through interlibrary loan • bibliographies that represent choices made by group of people building library collection • a searchable collection of records of every item in a library • catalogue points to location of a particular source, or group of sources, that library owns on your topic • manual and electronic catalogues

  5. LIBRARY TOOLS (2) Uses • to help patrons and librarians locate items, keeping track of and organize materials • to find out what items the library owns on your topic • to find where a specific item is located in the library • gives standard information on author, publisher, ISBN, and possibly prices

  6. LIBRARY TOOLS (3) Types of catalogues • The book catalogue: • Earliest form of catalogue. • Ancient libraries listed the titles in the collection on paper that were bound in book form. • The card catalogue • Cards are filed in alphabetical order in drawers that fit into a specially designed cabinet. • Libraries either type or print their own cards , or an outside printer, or already printed cards from commercial dealer or many library supply companies.

  7. LIBRARY TOOLS (4) Types of catalogues (contd) • OPAC(Online Public Access Catalogue) • most popular catalog form. • With a touch screen or keyboard users can get or access to most up-to-date information.

  8. LIBRARY TOOLS (5) Key terms • Bibliographic record: A term used to describe the cataloguing information for an item. Included are author, title, publisher, date of publication, physical description of the item and any other pertinent information needed to identify the materials as a unique item. • Access point: A term or name that can be used to retrieve the bibliographic information from a card or an online catalogue. Example , authors name , title of the book and so on.

  9. LIBRARY TOOLS (6) • Added entries: Other access points besides, the main entry to identify the work. For example , joint author and title series. • Catalogue code: This is a set of rules for the guidance of cataloguers in preparing entries for catalogues so as to ensure uniformity in treatment

  10. LIBRARY TOOLS (7) • electronic catalogues - Online Public Access Catalogue (OPAC). • At the University of Ghana, you can access the OPAC (UGCaT) from http://balme.ug.edu.gh/

  11. How to search the OPAC • By author - use this option when searching particular author. Generally, last name, Smith, Martha • By title - know title of a work, or part of title, or want search that is more precise by keyword search. Omit words like a, an, the, to, or, and, with, next, etc. • By subject - for focused search for materials about persons or topics, by time period, by place, or by type of publication (i.e. bibliography, encyclopedias, handbooks, statistics, etc.) For example: Human biology Encyclopedias

  12. How to search Opac (2) • By Keyword (Search Everything) • terms, titles, subjects, and summary note fields in any part of catalog record. Note: often least accurate method of searching. • By call number- materials on particular subject area. For example: QH13will retrieve all books with that call number and its extensions.

  13. Activity 4 • Using the OPAC list five books relevant to your area of study that you find online. Remember to include the full bibliographic details, that is, the author, title, place, publisher, ISBN, subject headings, call number, etc.

  14. Strategies for searching • Keyword search • Boolean search + Implied Boolean • Natural language search • Proximity operators • Truncation/wildcards • Subject headings – controlled vocabulary • Thesaurus or Index

  15. Strategies for searching(2) Keyword search • standard ways of retrieving information from any electronic database, ie online library catalog , periodical database or Internet database. • Keywords describe topic of research • Can be individual words or a phrase • Choose significant words & come up with synonyms • Key word search available in almost all databases

  16. Strategies for searching(3) • Keyword search …… • Many databases require explicit description of relationship between keywords • eg alternative fuels being used in automobiles • Alterntive fuels: electricity, ethanol, natural gas, hydrogen fuel cells • Automobiles: cars, vehicles, transportation,motor vehicle

  17. Strategies for searching(4) • Boolean search • Boolean uses three common words as logical operators; AND, OR and NOT • allows one to combine words and phrases to either limit or expand the search • OR - connector that allows either word to be present in each record in results. Use OR to expand your search. • Search Term Hits • Adolescents 15,900,000 hits • Teenagers 34,600,000 hits • Adolescents or teenagers 46,500,000 hits • Either 'adolescents' or 'teenagers' (or both) will be present in each record.

  18. Strategies for searching(5) • Boolean ….. • AND - connector that requires both words to be present in each record in results. Use AND to narrow your search. • Adolescents AND teenagers 7,390,000 hits • NOT - connector that requires first word be present in each record in results, but only if record does not contain second word. • Adolescents NOT teenagers 27,100,000 hits

  19. OR - allows either word to be present in each record in results Use OR to expand your search. adolescents OR teenagers Strategies for searching(6) Adolescents Teenagers

  20. AND - requires both words to be present in each record in results Use AND to narrow your search. Adolescents AND teenagers Adolescents AND teenagers Strategies for searching(7) Adolescents Teenagers

  21. NOT - requires first word be present in each record in results, but only if record does not contain second word. operator NOT is also used to make a more restrictive set Adolescents NOT teenagers Strategies for searching(8) Adolescents Teenagers

  22. Strategies for searching(9) Implied Boolean • refers to search in which symbols are used to represent Boolean logical operators • (+) represents AND • the minus sign (-) represents NOT • no sign at all as an OR relation. • Examples: • +scientific_revolution +women_ in _Europe

  23. Strategies for searching(10) • Phrase search — enclosing phrase in quotation marks help ensure that database searches for those words as a group. • database then searches for those word together in specific order you provided. Phrases or combinations of words“scientific revolution" OR scientific_revolution Predetermined language in a user fill-in template • all of these words (=AND) any of these words (=OR) must not contain (=NOT)

  24. Strategies for searching(11) • Truncation shortening a word or eliminating some characters from a longer term to pick up variants • a form of the Boolean operator OR. • items that share a common sequence of characters, even if they do not share all the same characters are put into single set • process called ‘wildcard’ search or stemming

  25. Strategies for searching(12) • Some databases allow certain symbols to be used for searching different forms of a word (such as plurals) or different spellings • Check help screens of particular database to determine appropriate symbols to use. • Symbols used in truncation • asterisk (*) • question mark (?) • colon (:) • plus sign (+)

  26. Strategies for searching(13) • adolescen* retrieves adolescent, adolescents, or adolescence (right truncation) • teen##### would retrieve teens and teenager and teenagers • *ship retrieves relationship, librarianship, friendship (left truncation) • wom#n retrieves woman or women (middle truncation)

  27. Strategies for searching(14) Natural language search • easiest to understand, but many databases don't offer it as a function. • search using regular spoken language, such as English. • Ask database question or type sentence that describes information you are looking for • database then uses programmed logic to determine keywords in sentence by their position in sentence. • The Internet search service Ask.com offers natural language searching. Ask.com

  28. Strategies for searching(15) • Proximity operators (closeness) • Proximity operators – allow location of one word within certain distance of another. • symbols generally used in this type of search are w and n. • w represents word "with(in)" and n represents word "near." • type of search not available in all databases. • Near Operator (Nx) — finds words within x number of words from each other, regardless of order in which they occur. • Example: television n2 violence would find "television violence" or "violence on television," but not "television may be the culprit in recent high school violence."

  29. Strategies for searching(16) • Within Operator (Wx) — finds words within x number of words from each other, in order they are entered in search. • Example: Franklin w2 Roosevelt would find Franklin Roosevelt or Franklin Delano Roosevelt or Franklin D. Roosevelt, but would not find Roosevelt Franklin.

  30. Strategies for searching(17) • Subject headings – controlled vocabulary • match search subject or concept with term used by indexer • Two basic lists of subject headings consulted by reference librarians • Library of Congress Subject Headings- lists the standard LC subject heading in alphabetical order • Sears List of Subject Headings – rough equivalent of the LC subject headings for smaller libraries.

  31. Strategies for searching(18) • results of an initial search reveal that article citations have subject headings or descriptors. Articles that have similar content will have same subject headings even if authors of articles used different terms to describe topic. • For example, one author may use phrase "capital punishment" and another "death penalty." • subject heading on both records will be same. • Sometimes subject headings are hyperlinked • can link to other articles with similar content.

  32. Strategies for searching(19) • Thesaurus or Index • A list of subject headings used in particular database is often referred to as a thesaurus. • Some databases have sophisticated thesauri that provide cross-references. • Eg "death penalty,“ thesaurus might ask you to use "capital punishment" instead • Some thesauri also include description of term, and a list of broader, narrower, and related terms.

  33. TECHNIQUES FOR SEARCHING • Define your information need or formulate your topic. For example: The involvement of women in the scientific revolution of the 16th-18th centuries in Europe • Identify keywords/concepts in the topic – articles and prepositions not keywords ;For example : women, science, Europe, 16th century • Find synonyms for keywords/concepts – broader terms, narrower terms or related terms, spelling variants, abbreviations, alternative words

  34. Techniques for searching (2) • Eg: Women: gender, female ;Science: zoology, biology, medicine, etc; Europe: England, Italy, Germany, France, etc; 15th, 17th, 18th, Enlightenment age • Words and synonyms become search terms • Use search tools (search engines, etc • Combine search terms with Boolean operators

  35. Executing the search If your search returns too many matches: • Add more AND terms to pinpoint your area of interest. • Add more NOT terms to eliminate irrelevant matches. If your search returns too little matches: • Try reducing the number of AND terms to broaden your area of focus • Try adding variants of your search terms with OR. • Use a broader term describing the subject matter in the search

  36. Activity 5 • Select any two search engines and search for probability theory. • Search for same subject as a phrase, enclosed in quotes: “probability theory” • Select any two meta search engines and search for Artificial intelligence • Select any two subject directories listed above (not the portals) and follow the subject categories -- do NOT use the search box -- to search for information on: conservation of energy and momentum

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