Locating+Information

The five minutes it will take you to skim this page will save you hours of frustration once you begin the process of looking for information about your research topic.


 * SEARCH TIPS & TRICKS**


 * **Use Quotation Marks** - When you are searching for an exact phrase, put your search terms in quotation marks. For example, instead of typing //literature review,// type //"literature review."// Instead of typing //literacy development// type //"literacy development".// You can also use this technique in conjunction with other terms. For example, if I want information on the literacy development of adolescents, but not elementary students, I could type //"literacy development" adolescents -elementary// Using this technique will produce MUCH more fruitful search results! For more a simple, well-structured, nicely illustrated explanation about this, visit **[|Boolean Searching on the Internet: A Primer in Boolean Logic]** at http://library.albany.edu/internet/boolean.html


 * **Search for Specific File Types -** Google will allow you to search for specific kinds of files. To do this, follow this formula: //filetype:DocumentExtension "your search term"// So I could type //filetype:doc "literacy development" adolescents// to find all the Microsoft Word documents posted on the web in which those terms appear. You can do the same thing for Adobe PDF files (a good technique if you are trying to locate a copy of a journal article), for PowerPoint files (ppt) for Excel files (xls), etc.


 * SEARCH TOOLS**


 * **[|CiteULike] -** This free, online service lets you search by discipline, as well as by key words in abstracts, article titles, journal titles, people's personal tags, etc. You can also browse journals and explore research articles that others have tagged and rated as useful to them. It also allows you to browse in multiple languages, to bookmark the articles you find for access later, to export bibliographic information to Endnote, and to subscribe to RSS feeds for particular pages or topics. An excellent tool for researchers!


 * **[|Google Scholar]** – Returns only scholarly articles and books (as opposed to a 5th grader's webpage about the topic), tells you how many people have cited them, and links you to related articles [|http://scholar.google.com]


 * **[|Altavista (Images, MP3/Audio, Video)] -** Click on the tabs at the top to tell the search engine to find images, audio, video, etc. You can even click the boxes to specify particular formats! An image search is a particularly useful technique for helping you to think about the concepts you are researching from new angles. http://www.altavista.com/audio/default


 * **[|Dogpile] -** Searches across search engines


 * **[|Google Alerts]** – It is now truly possible to research while you are sleeping! Simply enter a search term and your e-mail address, click submit, and Google will notify you via an e-mail message when anything is posted on the web on the topic of your choice http://www.google.com/alerts/


 * **[|Google Books]** – Lets you search the full text of lots of different books [|http://books.google.com]


 * **[|Google Reader]** - After creating a free account, you can use this service to help you find websites about your research topic, to help you "subscribe" to each one (for free) using RSS technology, and to keep track of all of the updates that are made to them. **[|Bloglines]** is another, similar service. For more information about RSS "feeds," visit this **[|RSS Quick Start Guide for Educators]** http://www.weblogg-ed.com/rss_for_ed


 * **[|Grokker] -** Allows you to receive your results in a traditional list, or organized as a concept map! This is especially helpful if you are researching a topic that you don't know very much about and are wondering how your topic fits into the larger field http://www.grokker.com


 * **[|Monitor This]** - Allows you to subscribe to RSS feeds from 22 different search engines regarding the search terms of your choice. (You have to know how to save an OPML file to make this work in your feed reader.)


 * **[|Newseum] -** Links to today’s front page for 300 newspapers from around the world. Great for locating international, breaking news on your topic. http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/


 * **[|Pathfinder for Educational Research] -** Links to databases, journals, and governmental resources for educational researchers - [|http://mciu.org/~spjvweb/edresearch.html]


 * **[|Research Beyond Google: 119 Authoritative, Invisible, & Comprehensive Resources]**: - Tips for searching "deep" and "invisible" online resources. http://oedb.org/library/college-basics/research-beyond-google


 * **[|Quintura]** - A very cool search engine that returns the results visually. Mouse over one of the tag words to see additional layers of results. Especially useful for getting a quick overview of how a problem in which you are interested relates to other fields [|http://www.quintura.com] See the new site for kids here: http://kids.quintura.com/


 * **[|Similicio.us]** - Beautiful, simple site. Type in a URL and this little application returns similar sites culled from people's del.icio.us tags. Very ingenious.


 * **[|Technorati: Tag Search]** - Lets you search the "tags" other people have applied to existing articles and websites. This is a good way to locate potentially fruitful search terms that you can use to refocus or expand your search http://www.technorati.com/tags/


 * **[|Wikiseek]** - Allows you to search Wikipedia. What makes it unique is that it displays a tag cloud at the top of your results containing related search terms.


 * SEARCH TUTORIALS**
 * **[|Google Guide] -** Nice tutorials (for both novices and experienced users) on searching with Google. http://www.googleguide.com/index.html To see how what you type in Google changes the search results, visit: http://21cif.imsa.edu/tools/locate/


 * **[|Noodle Tools: Information Literacy Search Strategies] -** Links to search tools and information portals organized by the kind of task one wishes to accomplish. Worth exploring, even if you //think// you possess expert skills in searching! http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/information/5locate/adviceengine.html