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Education Resources at FLITE

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Getting Started With Your Research

Not sure even how to begin the research process? Our FLITE guided tutorial, Getting Started With Your Research, may help you jumpstart your project quickly.

You can also take a journey with the Spybrarian and explore the steps of the research process more carefully in Ouroboros: Seven Steps to Enlightened Research, our Flash-animated tutorial.

Suggestions to retrieve better/more results:

  • Search topic as both a keyword and subject
  • Combine terms with AND or OR
  • Set date ranges limit to a specific time
  • Use quotes for phrases
  • Subject searching: Search for the subject of your topic.
    (Sometimes difficult to determine)
    Example:
    Topic: Early language development
    Subject: Language acquisition

  • Keyword searching: Search for keywords on your topic.
    Example:
    Topic: Early literacy
    Keyword(s): Beginning reading, beginning writing, emerging literacy

Finding Journal Articles for Research

To find journal articles on a particular topic, it's necessary to use one or more of the databases available on the FLITE Web site. These databases cumulatively provide indexing to thousands of journal titles. A few of the databases provide full-text (content of the articles is found directly within the database), but some only provide citations (description of where the article originally appeared in print). Please read Off-Campus Database Access if you want to do your searching from home.

Also, you can contact our Distance Education librarian, Stacy Anderson, for any off-campus issues you may have or general help as well. Email her or call her at 591-3635.

Some of the databases we recommend you try include:

Education Databases
General Databases

or click here to see all of our databases listed by name.

Getting the Article

If HTML or PDF full text options are available, click the link to go directly to the full text.

If full text is not an option:

Click the "Find It", link or button;
find it button

Select red GO button.

go button

If the only message you see is "Request document via Interlibrary Loan", you will need to order the article. By clicking on the link in the window provided, you will be directed to a blank Interlibrary Loan form to be filled out.Sometimes the "Find It" button will provide a link to the Online Catalog. This indicates that the journal is found in FLITE's print collection.

To look up whether FLITE owns a particular journal, use the Find--Journals database to search for the journal title, such as Career and Technical Education Research or Educational Research.

You can also use the Journals tab in the library catalog. Remember to use the journal title not the article title for your search.

Scholarly Journals

The library has developed a Guide to Popular and Scholarly Periodicals to assist you in determining if articles come from Scholarly Journals, also called Academic Journals, and from Peer-Reviewed Journals, also called Refereed Journals. Most databases have a special tab or a special limit function, to allow you to select scholarly and peer-reviewed journals.

Research Guide: Education

Research Guide for Education is available to help you research. You may be able to find these resources at your local library if you are off-campus.

MeL

As a researcher or as an educator, the MeL collection of databases should be very helpful to you and to your students. Several of the major FLITE databases are available as free online resources to the citizens of Michigan, provided by the Library of Michigan without charge. Use this valuable tool yourself, and promote it to your students: MeL - the Michigan eLibrary Click on MeL Databases - See Databases From Home for a list of available resources, including Academic OneFile, ERIC, and Educator's Reference Complete. When you are no longer a Ferris student and not in a library, you will need to use either your Michigan library card barcode number or your Michigan Driver's License/ID number to access the databases.

Books

Many books are available from FLITE. Try searching the online catalog, for the keyword: "education". You might also want to try other keywords that relate to "education", such as "teaching", "learning", or more specific topics such as "collaborative learning".

Don't forget about using Online books, also known as ebooks or electronic books. FLITE provides more than 110,000 book titles online. We have prepared a short tutorial Finding and Reading Online Books and a web document, Finding Online Books, as guides for you with tips for using the different interfaces from the four major vendors we use: Ebrary, Springer, Credo Reference, and NetLibrary. (Hint: always turn your browser's pop-up blocker off when accessing online books or articles from library databases.)

Reference Materials

Reference books are a great way to gather background, explore topics, and gain a general understanding about a variety of topics. Printed reference books are located on the First Floor.
Electronic reference books can be reached at the Online Reference Resources page. Then click on the Education subject heading in the left hand column. Credo Reference is another great staring point.

On the Web

Here are two reliable Internet web sites covering education topics:

Looking for Education statistics and datasets from the federal government? Try these reliable websites from the U. S. Department of Education.

  • United States Education Dashboard
    Debuting January 24, 2011, this federal website provides easy access to state and national education data, monitoring many indicators measuring the progress at every level of public education across the county in pursuit of President Obama's goal: by 2020, the United States once again will have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

  • Data.ed.gov
    Launched June 17, 2010, this U.S. Department of Education website aims to increase access to education data. Ultimately, this will be a location for practitioners, researchers, and the public to find information about US DOE grant programs.

  • Education Statistics - The 2012 Statistical Abstract:The National Data Book
    Education statistics gathered and collated by the U. S. Census Bureau, covering formal education at various levels and for public and private schools. Find data about the school-age population and school enrollment, educational attainment, education personnel, and financial aspects of education. Look as well for data about charter schools, computer usage in schools, distance education, and adult education.

OWL - Purdue University Online Writing Lab and Ferris Writing Center

The Online Writing Lab at Purdue (http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/) is an invaluable reference for writing research papers. Covering everything from creating a thesis statement and coping with writer's block to formatting citations and the principles of academic writing, this comprehensive web site is a resource tool for every paper you'll ever need to write.

The Ferris Writing Center offers free assistance to all FSU students, faculty, and staff. In addition to tutoring help on-campus, the Writing Center will do tutoring online, including reviews of research papers and citation consultations. Don't pass up this opportunity for help.

Hot Topics in Education

APA Citations

Check out our Citations web page for help with your references and bibliographies! Avoid plagiarism by properly citing your sources.

The following links provide information on how to use APA:

Citation Style Guide: APA (PDF)
An APA Citation Style guide with examples created by FLITE.

Copies of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Sixth Edition, are available either from the Ready Reference section near the FLITE Oval Information Desk or at the Desk itself.

KnightCite and Son of Citation Machine - Help with Citations

KnightCite, a tool prepared by the Hekman Library at Calvin College, will help you format your citations properly if you are having trouble figuring out the proper form.

Son of Citation Machine is a tool which you can use to create bibliographies. Please be aware that you will have to review your bibliography to ensure it is correct.

KnightCite
(www.knightcite.com)

Son of Citation Machine
(http://citationmachine.net)

Contact: Kristen Motz / Email / Phone: 231-591-3625 / Office: FLITE 140H

Don't forget, you are welcome to come to the Oval Information Desk and ask for help any time. You can also call us 231-591-3602 or chat with us.

Make an appointment for a research consultation with a librarian - one-on-one personal library help.

Last update: January 17, 2012



Rick Bearden
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