Thing #23: Final Quiz

Your exam will consist of 20 questions worth half a point each, for a total of 10 points.

Things to review (use the downloadable handouts from the blog homepage, and the library 1210 delicious bookmarked pages, conveniently tagged by subject and week, at http://del.icio.us/liby1210):

1. Library of Congress call numbers and subject headings (what they are & how they work--you don't need to know what specific call numbers mean)

2. APA format (general rules)

3. Characteristics of scholarly books and journals

4. Search engines & Databases (how to use them and when)

5. Tags vs. Subject Headings

6. Boolean Operators (AND, OR & NOT)

7. Web Site Evaluation

Good luck, everyone!

Thing #22: Final Project Part B--Annotated Reference List

See the project assignment and sample project for details.

Due with thing #22, printed and stapled. Hand in at the reference desk by 5PM
Friday 3/9.

Questions? Contact me.

Thing #21: Final Project Part A--Narrative

See the project assignment and sample project for details.

Due with thing #22, printed and stapled. Hand in at the reference desk by 5PM
Friday 3/9.

Questions? Contact me.

Thing #20: Explore a Few Award-Winning Web 2.0 sites

As we begin to wrap up our exploration of emerging web tools & how they relate to information-seeking, we'd like you to take a look at some of the most innovative sites on the web (2.0, of course).

For this thing, you'll visit SEOmoz.org's 2006 Web 2.o Awards. Browse through the categories and find 2 sites. One should be related to information seeking or organizing, but the second is up to you (pick something fun like shopping, games, etc.)

Here are a few award-winners that I especially like.

knowmore.org: Learn about corporations' labor practices and ethics (or lack thereof) on this wiki
Stumbleupon.com: Randomly connects you with websites based on your personal interests
Rollyo.com: Create your own search engines of web sites; easily add new sites from your browser
Bloglines.com: Multi-functional RSS manager where you can blog, search for and manage feeds
Arcaplay.com: Free, online game central w/classic, puzzle, sports, action and other games

For each of your choices:

• Describe the purpose of the site
• Describe a few interesting features
• How you would use this site to track or manage information in life

Due by Monday, 2/26 @ 9PM

Thing #19: Find Periodical Articles About Your Project

Use the library databases to search periodical literature on your topic.

Types of articles you might look for include:

• Scholarly articles (from academic journals)
• Current newspaper articles
• Articles from popular magazines or trade publications

Databases to consider (Access all from A-Z list on the library web page):

• Academic Search Premier
  
• CINAHL
• Proquest Newspapers
  

Find 2 articles and provide complete APA citations. If you are having trouble with APA, see the class wiki, where I've created a resource page to assist you with APA style.

Post your citations with a brief statement (one or two sentences is fine) about why the article is a good source for you topical project.

Due Monday, 2/26 @ 9PM

Thing #18: Explore iTunesU or OpenCourseware

In the spirit of encouraging the pursuit of lifelong learning, we are asking you to take a look at some sites that provide university level educational materials free to the public. These online resources can supply extra study materials to assist you in courses at CSU East Bay as well as help you learn about new subjects once you graduate.

There are two options for this assignment. One is to take a look at OpenCourseWare at MIT. The other requires that you have the program iTunes loaded on your computer so that you can explore iTunesU. Hopefully, in the near future, CSUEB will be joining the ranks of those schools providing lectures and other materials on iTunesU.

Directions:

1. Go to one of the following: iTunesU at Berkeley OR MIT OpenCourseWare (in order to pick iTunes U, you must have iTunes installed on your computer)

2. Pick a subject and then a course within that subject.

3. Check out the materials available, listen to part of a podcast or lecture, and/or read some lecture notes/handouts.

4. Post the following to your blog:

• Name of the course and course instructor
• Two new things you learned about the subject matter covered in the course

Blog post due: Monday, February 19th by 9pm.

Thing #16: Find Some Books

Using the strategies for book selection we went over in class, find 2 books that are either about your topic or contain a significant section or chapter about your topic. Remember that ebooks "count" as books.

Although we focused on non-reference sources in class, one of your selections here may be a reference source (encyclopedia entry, handbook, dictionary, etc.). You may want to check out some of the library's online reference sources, such as the Gale Virtual Reference Library (see the A-Z list of databases).

Post APA citations for your choices. For APA examples, check here.

Use these examples to guide you through formatting your citations and, if you wish, use Noodletools to generate the citation and save it to your bibliography. With these resources at your disposal, I expect the citations to be perfect.

Due by Monday, 2/19 at 9PM