Competency 9: webpage

http://www.homeedmag.com/
This is the home page for the Home Education Magazine. I found this website by searching Google. The term I entered for my search was “homeschooling and the public library use.” An article from the January-Feburary 2002 issue, lead me to this webpage. The article “Homeschool Resource Center in a Public Library” by Kathy Wentz encouraged me to continue browsing through the webpage. This website is informative for the those interested in homeschooling, want to start homeschooling, or already are participating. This magazine offers many options such as posting the article, offering a Q&A section, and links to other helpful web pages. This can be a positive website for those looking a nontraditional education for younger school-aged students.

Competency 8: Research visual/ multimedia

In their annual report the Clive Public Library produced a pie graph showing the usage of circulation material for 2007-2008. I chose to use this graph because it allows for people to see the types of material used at a public library. While children’s material is the largest, the second largest is Adult Non-fiction. The large quantity of Non-Fiction material used shows that people use the public library to further their education. The part this graph fails to represent is the type of people how are using these materials.

Library Using Statistics. Clive Library. http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.cityofclive.com/departments/library/images/piegraph.png&imgrefurl=http://www.cityofclive.com/departments/library/usage-statistics/index.php%3Fcatid%3DLibrary&usg=__VjIMBpWitjJgGvhBuhleia6ZNHY=&h=537&w=1023&sz=162&hl=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=8kV1k6CExKzi_M:&tbnh=79&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dpublic%2Blibrary%2Buse%2Bstatistics%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26um%3D1, (accessed Aug. 5, 2009)

Competency 7: Image

This image was chosen to represent the students who use the public library. This girl might be a homeschool student, a distance education student, or even someone who desires to learn about any topic. The Ocean City Public Library offers computer classes, as many public libraries do. Public libraries act as a great source of information for any of the above mentioned. The public library produces many educational options for students such as classes, free materials, computer use, and a quite place to study.

Free Computer Training. Ocean City Public Library. http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.oceancitylibrary.org/images/services/computer_training_sm.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.oceancitylibrary.org/services/technology/computertraining.html&usg=__m2M9XdfvDwWB2xj_8Fe7aC8QnNs=&h=384&w=576&sz=48&hl=en&start=126&um=1&tbnid=6l_L5JQl4hhWhM:&tbnh=89&tbnw=134&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlearning%2Band%2Bthe%2Bpublic%2Blibrary%26ndsp%3D18%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26start%3D108%26um%3D1,

(accessed Aug. 3, 2009)

Competency 6: Pearl Growing

The final database which I searched was ERIC. With this database I determined to use the Pearl Growing Method. I started with an article “Public Library Services for Home Schooling” by Denise G. Masters. While the Descriptors varied to include several different terms, I determined that I would continue to remain using the same terms, but also included the term “access to information.” This allowed for me to retain a very small number of hits. I appreciated this search method, because it helps the user determine other terms to use. It is especially helpful in the ERIC database, which has a large amount of documents. ERIC is relatively easy to use. Each of the databases tested are easy to use if some knowledge is obtained about searching and the database itself.

Competency 6: Specific Facet First

>

Using world cat I determined to focus my search on distance education and the use of the public library. I started the search by using distance education or nontraditional education. This resulted in a large number of results, but less than the number retrieved if I would have started with the public library as my original search term. I then determined I must add another facet, as suggested by the specific facet model. This limited the number of hits retrieved. Many of the hits did not seem geared toward the meaning of my search, but I was able to find several that worked well. WorldCat is a great database to negotiate. I was able to move between tabs easily, and the refine your search tool can be extremely helpful to users. The database also allows for the user to narrow the search easily once it is created. Using successive fraction model would be the most helpful on this database. Though specific facet worked as well.

Competency 6: Building Block

Library Lit allows for many search options. I specifically enjoyed the smart search option. This allowed for the program to be intuitive to my needs. I was able to find 49 documents, and many of these were documents that were helpful to my search. With this database I originally included distance education as part of the Boolean search, but removed it after a large number of irrelevant documents were retrieved. By narrowing the focus to strictly homeschooling and the use of the public library I was able to narrow my search to retrieve relevant documents.

Competency 6: Successive Fraction Search

I found that LEXIS was very simple to use. I was able to complete a successive fraction search in a simple manner. While it did not retrieve as many hits as I would have preferred, I was able to narrow the search to a limited number of hits. With only adding one more facet I was able to go from 1000 hits to ten hits. While ten hits is a more manageable number to search through, it is my opinion that the 1000 hits might have produced results that were not produced when the search was narrowed.