The Reference Section

1. The Reference Section Types of Reference Materials and How They Are Used

2. How is the reference section of the media center helpful for reseach? • GPS SS (6,7,8) Information Processing Skills checklist # 8—identify social studies reference resources to use for a specific purpose • QCC- Selects, retrieves, and uses appropriate and reliable resources of information. • ILS—Strives for excellence in information seeking and knowledge generation. • Core Standards—Gather relevant information from multiple print and digital resources.

3. What is the reference section? • The reference section houses books that are not available for general checkout. • These books are used primarily for research

4. General Encyclopedia • Contain an alphabetically organized listing of a broad range of subjects with basic information for each entry. • General encyclopedias provide a good basis for the beginning stages of research and are helpful resources for ready reference questions. • Multi-volume set of books with an index.

5. Specific Encyclopedia • Contain the same type of information and organized like a general encyclopedia. • The entries are limited to those that fall within the subject encyclopedia's scope of the coverage. • Examples include UXL Encyclopedia of Science or the UXL Encyclopedia of Weather and Natural Disasters

6. Almanac • ALMANACS give facts, statistics, and basic information on almost everything from agriculture to zoos.  • They are an excellent reference source for population, business, sports, and agricultural statistics.  • They also list the elected officials of state and local governments.  • A typical almanac will include a section of important events that occurred during the year. 

7. Atlas • Contain an organized group of physical, political, road, and/or thematic maps. • Symbols, scales, and terms used in the atlas should be explained in an easy to understand and complete manner. • You can find geographical information as well as information on populations, natural resources, climate, etc. in most world atlases.

8. Dictionary • Dictionaries contain words of a given language and other information such as their origins, pronunciations, and definitions. • You can often find part of speech, plural spellings, and synonyms or antonyms. • Unabridged dictionaries contain 250,000 words or more, but we have shorter versions called abridged dictionaries in our libraries. • Special dictionaries include picture dictionaries, foreign language dictionaries, synonym dictionaries, thesauri, etc

9. Thesaurus • A thesaurus is a special kind of dictionary of synonyms; that is, words that have similar meanings (for example: correct, accurate, exact). Sometimes it gives you antonyms (words with opposite meanings) as well. • These are useful for writing to add variety to your work and to find precise, accurate words for conveying your message.

10. Indexes • Contain information necessary for locating information in a given specific item or a type of resource. • Like an index in the back of a non-fiction book, indexes help to locate information in periodicals, anthologies, newspapers, etc. • Concordances and quotation dictionaries are specific types of indexes.

11. Biographical Dictionaries • BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARIES are collections of entries of varying lengths about the lives of individuals, arranged alphabetically by surname. • There can be specific biographical dictionaries such as identifying people by county, race, time period, or special event or status.

12. Activity • With a partner, attempt to answer the question in your envelope. • Write your answer on your own paper, not on the envelope or question. • You may use any of the reference materials from the reference section. • You MAY NOT use a computer/internet.