First-Year Seminars Research Guide

Academic Year 2012-2013

INTRODUCTION

The purpose of this guide is to help first-year students develop their ability to locate, evaluate, and use information in a variety of formats, laying the foundation for becoming independent life-long learners.

Library Research

Try these first

All Items by Source

Audio Files
Encyclopedias
Evaluating Resources
Images

Journals/Magazines
Multiple E-Reference Collections
Newspapers
Reviews

Statistics/Data
Video/DVD
Writing and Plagiarism

Journals/Magazines

Academic OneFile Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
1980 - current. Interdisciplinary index covering over 10,000 scholarly and popular journals and magazines. Most references include full-text or links to full-text. Contains all of Expanded Academic Index ASAP. Coverage of scientific journals is limited. Shortcuts: go/onefile (on campus), http://go.middlebury.edu/onefile (off-campus).

JSTOR Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Full-text archive of over 1000 scholarly journals in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. For off-campus access, enter your Middlebury username and password when prompted. Shortcuts: go/jstor (on campus), http://go.middlebury.edu/jstor (off campus). All Middlebury alumni can access our JSTOR archived journals, dating up to five years ago. To access JSTOR for Middlebury alumni visit http://go.middlebury.edu/jstoralum.

Periodicals Archive Online (PAO) Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Searchable archive of hundreds of digitized journals published in the arts, humanities and social sciences from 1665 - 2000. PAO is searchable with the British Periodicals I & ll collection. Also see Periodicals Index Online for indexing to additional journals titles.

Project Muse Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Offers full-text of over 100 scholarly journals in the humanities, social sciences, and mathematics from the 1990s to present. This is a subscription resource; for off-campus access, enter your Middlebury username and password when prompted. Shortcuts: go/muse (on campus), http://go.middlebury.edu/muse (off-campus).

Scopus Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only
Scopus is an abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature and quality web sources with tools to track, analyze and visualize research. It is similar to Web of Science (Science Citation Index and Social Science Citation Index) but also includes arts and humanities resources. Shortcut: go/scopus (on campus) or http://go.middlebury.edu/scopus (off-campus)

Summon Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Summon is our newest and most effective tool for searching many resources at once, so we’ve put it right at the center of the library home page (look for the “Summon” tab in the “Library Quick Search” box). Summon searches most library resources including MIDCAT, full-text newspapers and journals, and most of our library databases. Read more about it in the LIS blog. Watch a video tutorial.

Newspapers

Middlebury College Library Newspapers Guide Unrestricted Resource
Directs you to all current and historical newspaper resources available at Middlebury.

Multiple E-Reference Collections

Gale Virtual Reference Library Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
A collection of subject-specific encyclopedias published by Gale. Search across the whole collection or narrow your search by subject area or title of reference work.

Online Reference Resources (E-Ref Guide) Unrestricted Resource
This Middlebury Library Subject Guide provides links to online reference resources including online dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs, directories, and much more. Go shortcut = go/eref.

Oxford Reference Online Premium Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
General reference resources, including encyclopedias, bilingual dictionaries, chronologies, and maps and illustrations.

Vermont Online Library (Gale) Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
The Vermont Online Library (Gale) provides access to over a dozen different databases ranging from business, health, computer, and newspaper databases to K-12 resources. Both academic and popular materials are included as well as some full-text. See individual database descriptions for details.

Audio Files

Video, Image, and Sound Effects Subject Guide Unrestricted Resource
Search for videos, audio files, images, sound effects, and more.

Encyclopedias

Access Science Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Provides authoritative information for non-specialists on a wide variety of science-related topics. Includes the 20-volume McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology, the McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms and the Yearbooks of Science & Technology in addition to biographies from the Hutchinson Dictionary of Scientific Biography, selected Science News articles, and links to evaluated web sites. Shortcuts: go/accsci (on campus), http://go.middlebury.edu/accsci (off-campus).

Encyclopedia Britannica Online Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
Academic edition. Search by subject or keyword. In addition to topical essays, timelines, images, and videos, it provides links to full text journal articles and links to related websites.

Evaluating Resources

CRAP Test for Evaluating Sources Unrestricted Resource
Currency, Reliabilty, Authority, Purpose/Point of View. Adapted by Vanderbilt from the original by Molly Beestrum, Dominican University.

Evaluating Information Found on the Internet Unrestricted Resource
Excellent overview of some of the challenges evaluating information found on the web. From the Sheridan Libraries, Johns Hopkins University.

Evaluating Web Content Unrestricted Resource
Brief guide from the University at Albany Libraries.

Evaluating Webpages for Research Unrestricted Resource
Nicely designed chart from Virginia Tech Libraries. Lays out rationale for evaluating information, with specific criteria and advice about what to look for.

Five Criteria for Evaluating Web Pages Unrestricted Resource
More information from Olin & Uris libraries, Cornell University.

Internet Detective Tutorial (Evaluating Internet Resources) Unrestricted Resource
Interactive tutorial for evaluating online resources.

Images

ARTStor Middlebury Students, Faculty and Staff only Some full text available
A digital library of nearly one million images in the areas of art, architecture, the humanities, and social sciences.

Video, Image, and Sound Effects Subject Guide Unrestricted Resource
Search for videos, audio files, images, sound effects, and more.

Reviews

Book Reviews Subject Guide Unrestricted Resource
For additional sources of book reviews, see the separate Book Reviews Guide.

Statistics/Data

Statistics Guide Unrestricted Resource
For statistics on a broad range of topics arranged A-Z (crime, demographics, children, labor, etc.) this statistics guide has links to both national and international resources.

Video/DVD

Video, Image, and Sound Effects Subject Guide Unrestricted Resource
Search for videos, audio files, images, sound effects, and more.

Writing and Plagiarism

Citation and Style Guides Unrestricted Resource
Created by Middlebury College librarians. A guide to writing papers & citing sources.

Middlebury Student Handbook: Academic Honesty, Honor Code, Disciplinary Policies Unrestricted Resource Some full text available
Describes Middlebury College expectations of students regarding academic honesty and the honor code.

Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing Guide Unrestricted Resource Some full text available
Guide from Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL).