Week 3: Databases: Pre-search Preparation and Strategies. Chapter 5: Preparing for the Search. Christi Farrar, EBSCO Explora. Geoff Thieke, Gale Cengage. The Information Literacy User's Guide: An Open, Online Textbook. Week 4: Databases:Controlled Vocabulary/Thesauri (*=Key reading) Week 4: Dialog, Command Line and Free Text Search. Online Searching: 7 Free Text. Synopsis.
Free text (FT) searching allows searchers to use any words and phrases in their search statements, not just those that come from the database’s controlled vocabulary (CV). Use it to extend searching to the entire surrogate record, even to entire full-texts, and to produce high recall results, that is, searches with as many relevant sources as possible. The bigot in the machine – barbara fister. The New York Technical Services Librarians, an organization that has been active since 1923 – imagine all that has happened in tech services since 1923!
– invited me to give a talk about bias in algorithms. They quickly got a recording up on their site and I am, more slowly, providing the transcript. Thanks for the invite and all the tech support, NYTSL! The Bigot in the Machine: Bias in Algorithmic Systems Abstract: We are living in an “age of algorithms.” Hanging out with Amy Affelt 1. Serioussearchers.
Some secret strategies for serious searchers - NeverEndingSearch. I designed and currently teach a course called Search and the Information Landscape.
What I love about the course is getting my graduate students to think about their search habits and recognize what works. I also introduce a few classic strategies that have been around in the literature about online searching since the pre-web days. What I am finding is having names for these things kinda matters. So does understanding that you have a fuller bag of tricks than you realize. Oclcresearch library discovery directions preprint. Michael James on discovery search, EBSCO. Week 5: Touring some databases you should know. Week 5: Discovery Search & Strategy Review (*=Key reading)
Week 5: Touring K12 Databases (For more and full access, check our Database Trials page)