Research and resources

How the LRC can help you with your studies

We are in the ‘Information Age’

• Did You Know?

Where do I start?

• Make it easy on yourself• You can’t control the AMOUNT of information• You can control the QUALITY of information• Think about what you really need

6 key questions

• What? Why? How? Where? When? Who?

• Eg) Discuss the impact of colonial rule on British Burma before 1870.

• This should give you a starting point to look for the information you need

What resources can I use?

Start with the library catalogue

Discovery@Liverpool Community College

Check out our e-resources

Beware of Google

• Google is ranked• Google is funded by advertising• Google is the ‘white bread of the mind’*• “Google offers easy answers to difficult

questions. But students do not know how to tell if they come from serious, refereed work or are merely composed of shallow ideas, superficial surfing and fleeting commitments”

*According to Dr Tara Brabazon, University Of Brightonhttp://www.browsermedia.co.uk/2008/01/17/google-is-%E2%80%98white-bread-for-the-mind%E2%80%99/

Evaluating websites

• Who is the author of the site?• Do they have sufficient knowledge, credentials

and authority ?• Are there any contact details?• Is there an organisational or corporate

sponsor?• Is the page authentic or a hoax?• Is there a reference/reading/citations list?

How can you tell?• .gov Government agency• .net Internet Service Provider• .com Commercial site• .edu Education • .ac Academic • .mil Military• .org Organization (non-profit)• Countries are abbreviated to 2 letters –eg)UK,

FR (France), US (USA), TW (Taiwan)

Some plausible hoaxes..

• http://www.rythospital.com/2011/

• http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/

• http://www.hetracil.com/

A very useful tutorial

• The Internet detectivehttp://www.vtstutorials.ac.uk/detective/

Using Boolean operators

Boolean Logic on YouTube

To summarise....

AND   Use to narrow search and retrieve information containing all of the words it separates.

OR Use to broaden search and retrieve information containing any of the words it separates.

NOT Use to narrow search and retrieve information that contain none of the words following it.

Give me two subjects to search and I’ll apply Boolean

operators........

Make notes......

• What have I used?• Where did I access it?• Have I made reference to it?• Have I acknowledged it?

Plagiarism

Making referencing easier....

Harvard Referencing Generator - CiteThisForMe

Come and ask us!

• We are here to help you• Qualified librarians• IT qualifications• Teaching qualifications• If we cant answer your question straight away

we will endeavour to find out!

Exclusive! Coming soon....