Database search: Library Literature and Books in Print

My second grade students are learning about the woodland forest ecosystem in science this month. I am integrating writing skills with science. I want to teach my students how to research different kinds of animals and the layers of the forest and complete a technology project that will use the information they have researched. I am focusing the search on teaching students research skills in the library.

"naive' question"

What lessons do I need to prepare to teach my students how to use the library to research information about woodland forests and animals?"

Library Literature Database

First I constructed the table and used the same facets and alternate terms from the previous database search. I used the thesaurus and added a few more terms.

Boolean statement: (elementary school students or children or children's library services or school libraries) AND (research skills or library skills or research techniques) AND (lessons or activity projects or teaching methods)

SS1: (elementary school students or children or children's library services or school libraries) AND (research skills or library skills or research techniques) AND (lessons or activity projects or teaching methods)

results: 9 records

citations: Only one record out of the nine was relevent to the query.

Stimson, Margaret (2003). "Winnipeg Teacher Librarians' Strategies For Teaching Research Skills". School libraries in Canada (0227-3780), 22 (4), p. 35.

Books in Print Database
I used the same facets and alternate terms from the previous search. I was unable to locate a thesaurus tab to try and search for thesaurus terms. I went to the advanced search tab and proceeded to search using the terms I used from previous searches on other databases.

Boolean Statement:

(elementary school students or elementary education or children or children's library services or school libraries) AND (research skills or library skills) AND (lessons or activities or teaching methods)

advanced search

Status: In print and forthcoming

Format: books

SS1: (elementary school students or elementary education or children or children's library services or school libraries) AND (research skills or library skills) AND (lessons or activities or teaching methods)

results: 26 records

citations:

Carlson, Chris. (2009). Guiding Student into Information Literacy: Strategies for Teachers and Teacher-Librarians. United States: Scarecrow Press Incorporated.

Books in Print database also included a feature using a Boolean Statement so I tried it, I used the subject all index and then the Boolean statement I wrote above.

su=(elementary school students or elementary education or children or children's libraries or school libraries) AND (research skills or library skills) AND (lessons or activities or teaching methods)

results: 37 records

citation:

Harker, Christa et al. (2008) Library Research with Emergent Readers: Meeting Standards through Collaboration. United States: Linworth Publishing, Incorporated.

Conclusions:

The search conducted using the Library Literature Database was more difficult for me to locate thesaurus terms. There was hardly any articles relevant to my query. The search results using the Books in Print database had so many more resources available that fit my query and not just the subject headings.