FHUHS Library

Ninth Grade Library Research Unit

To the Student:

The purpose of this week-long unit is to enable you to master the skills you will need to formulate an appropriate search strategy, effectively gather information from a variety of sources, and evaluate the quality of the information you have retrieved. In a culminating project, you will demonstrate your mastery of these skills by describing, in a 3-4 paragraph essay, the advantages and disadvantages of the card catalog, online periodical databases and the Internet for researching a specific issue. You will determine if the sources you have retrieved are current, reliable, authoritative, and have good breadth of coverage. The rubric below indicates the acceptable level of achievement of these skills. Exemplars of essays which meet or exceed the standard are also included below.

Learning Objectives:

The student will be able to identify the advantages and disadvantages of the card catalog, online periodical databases and the Internet for researching a specific topic. The student will be able to use the four criteria of currency, reliability, authoritativeness and breadth of coverage to determine which resource or combination of resources would be most appropriate for the topic assigned.

Vermont Standards of Learning :

1.5 Students draft, revise, edit, and critique written products so that final drafts are appropriate in terms of the following dimensions: purpose, organization, details, voice or tone.

1.18 Students use computers, telecommunications, and other tools of technology to research, to gather information and ideas, and to represent information and ideas accurately and appropriately.

1.19 Students use organizational systems to obtain information from various sources (including libraries and the Internet).3.1 Students assess their own learning by developing rigorous criteria for themselves, and use these to set goals and produce consistently high-quality work.

Vermont Grade Level Expectations :

IT9-12:5 Students demonstrate use of technology for research by locating information from specialized online databases; selecting an appropriate tool for locating information on the Internet; implementing a search strategy using full Boolean logic; justifying decisions made, e.g., representing data, formatting, setting up formula, selecting criteria for search; justifying the appropriate tools and technology resources to address a variety of tasks and problems.

WHS:1 Students use prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and critiquing to produce final drafts of written products.WHS:8 In reports, students organize information/concepts by: using an organizational text structure appropriate to focus/controlling idea; drawing a conclusion by synthesizing information from report and relating it to broader ideas/concepts; obtaining information from multiple locations or sources when appropriate.

WHS:10 In reports, students demonstrate use of a range of elaboration strategies by: including facts and details relevant to focus/controlling idea, and excluding extraneous information; including sufficient details or facts for appropriate depth; commenting on the significance of the information throughout the report.

Materials/Technology used:

Students will use computers to search the automated catalog, online periodical database, and the Internet.

Instructional procedures (Overview):

Students will receive instruction on obtaining information from the automated card catalog, journals databases, and the Internet. Students will be given multiple opportunities to practice the skills they have learned to find information on specific topics. Incorporated into this instruction will be a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of each of these information-gathering tools in terms of obtaining resources that meet the four criteria of currency, reliability, authoritativeness, and breadth of coverage. For their culminating project, students will use these four criteria to determine which information-gathering tool (or combination of information-gathering tools) would be most appropriate for researching a specific topic. Students will write a 3-4 paragraph essay defending their position by using examples of resources they have located.

The reading/writing-to-learn strategies used/ or the major writing activities performed:

The culminating project will be a 3-4 paragraph essay which will require students to support their position by citing specific examples.

Assessment:

The culminating project will be evaluated using a rubric (reproduced below) which clearly indicates the acceptable level of achievement. In a meeting with the librarian, each student will self-assess his/her culminating project to determine if the requirements in the rubric have been met. Each student will be given the opportunity to revise his/her essay until the standard has been met.

Rubric for Culminating Paper in English 9 Library Unit

Assignment: The student will be able to identify the advantages and disadvantages of the card catalog, online periodical databases and the Internet for researching a specific topic. The student will be able to use the four criteria of currency, reliability, authoritativeness and breadth of coverage to determine which resource or combination of resources would be most appropriate for the topic assigned.

4 = Exceeds the standard
3 = Meets the standard
2 = Approaching the standard
1 = Below the standard

4 Demonstrates an understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of
different types of resources in terms of currency, reliability, authorita- tiveness and breadth of coverage. Can cite three or more specific examples to support his/her position regarding the reasons for using a particular resource (or combination of resources) to examine a certain topic.

3 Demonstrates an understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of different types of resources in terms of at least two of the four criteria (currency, reliability, authoritativeness, breadth of coverage). Can cite at least one example to support his/her position regarding the reason for using a particular resource to examine a certain topic.

2 Shows an awareness of the differences between various resources but gives little evidence of understanding the concepts of currency, reliability, authoritativeness or breadth of coverage. Can cite at least one example to show why a particular resource would be useful in examining a certain topic.

1 Gives little evidence of understanding the differences between the various types of resources. Cannot cite any examples to show why a particular resource would be more useful than any other in examining a specific topic.

Exemplar of Culminating Paper Which Exceeds the Standard

Question: Which of the information-gathering tools that we discussed (the card catalog, online periodical databases and the Internet) would be most useful in studying the Civil War? Would you use more than one? Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the card catalog, online periodical databases and the Internet for retrieving information relevant to your topic. Refer to the four criteria of currency, reliability, authoritativeness and breadth of coverage in evaluating the usefulness of the items you are able to retrieve with each of the information-gathering tools. Cite specific examples of the items you found.

Response: In researching the Civil War, I would use the card catalog the most. Currency is not such an important issue in researching a topic like the Civil War as it would be in researching some topic that is currently in the news. Reliability, authoritativeness and breadth of coverage would be more important considerations in studying the Civil War.

I started out doing an Internet search and came up with several potentially useful sites. One of these was The American Civil War Homepage (http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/). This site links to a large number of Internet resources and the author is listed, along with his academic credentials. This site appears to be reliable and authoritative and also provides good breadth of coverage.

There were several hundred documents retrieved in my Internet search and many of them would probably be useful, but I do not have the knowledge or background to determine the reliability or authoritativeness of much of this information. Therefore, the Internet would not be an important part of my search strategy.

I searched the periodicals database and retrieved 60 items, but many of these were either too narrow in focus or were written at too advanced a level for my needs. For instance, in the Vermont Online Library journals database, I found an article called ?��Review Essay: Robert E. Lee and Perspective Over Time.?�� It appeared in the March, 2003 issue of Civil War History. It was written by Michael C. Adams, who is identified as a professor of history and director of the Military History Program at Northern Kentucky University. The author is obviously an authority and because of his credentials we can assume the information is reliable. The article is also very current. However, the article is very narrow in scope and is written at too advanced a level to be useful to me.

I definitely found the card catalog to be the most useful. The library has a good collection of books on the Civil War. The librarian suggested The Centennial History of the Civil War by Bruce Catton, which is a standard work written by a recognized expert. It covers the Civil War from beginning to end and therefore meets the criteria of breadth of coverage as well as reliability and authoritativeness.

Exemplar of Culminating Project Which Meets the Standard

In researching the topic Rosa Parks I used the journals database to locate the following magazine article: “This Week in Black History” in Jet magazine. The article was dated December 8, 2003 and so is very current. I believe the information in the article is reliable because it is very close to what I have been hearing about Rosa Parks from my Social Studies teachers and what I have been reading about her in my history textbooks, and I believe my teachers and my textbooks are reliable sources.

I used the card catalog to locate the book Rosa Parks: My Story by Rosa Parks and Jim Haskins. I think this book is fairly current; it was published in 1992. I don’t think currency is that much of an issue. I also think this book is reliable because she wrote it and is describing events she was involved in herself. Plus books have to go through editors and other experts to make sure that the information in them is accurate, unlike the Internet.

I also used the card catalog again for my third source. The book is found is Rosa Parks by Douglas Brinkley. The book is dated 2000 and so is very current. This book I also think is reliable and authoritative because it was written by a Distinguished Professsor of History and Director of the Eisenhower Center at the University of New Orleans. He also is the author of other award-winning books and is known from articles he has published in the “The New York Times,” “The Washington Post,” and “Atlantic Monthly.”

I did not use the Internet because I don’t know enough about Rosa Parks to figure out if the information is reliable and you can’t count on the Internet to be true because nobody is in charge of editing the Internet.

In conclusion, I would have to use the card catalog because you can be more sure that the information is going to be reliable and authoritative. Currency is not the most important issue here. Books also are longer than articles or most Internet sites and so have more breadth of coverage.