Pew Learning Center and Ellison Library

FYS 145

From Black Mountain to Warren Wilson:

  A Group Exploration in/of Experiential Learning



Instructor: Matthews, Sebastian
Librarian:  Chris Nugent

Feel free to contact me for help at any time. My office is on the lower level of the library.  You can also reach me by phone or email:
Chris Nugent  (nugent@warren-wilson.edu, extension 3061)
I will be at the information desk in the library Wednesday and Thursday evenings.



Library Lingo
Research Tools

How to find:

    Web Resources for your topic
    Books on your topic
    Articles and Databases on your topic
    Reference Books
    Materials in the College Archives
   


What do these library words mean?
Source:  Adapted, with permission, from Hunter Library, Western Carolina University.

Bibliography - A list of the resources you used to write your paper.  An annotated bibliography also gives brief information about the content of each resource and its usefulness for the paper or project.

Call Number - A specific combination of letters and numbers assigned to a book that indicates the book's location on the shelf. Each book has its own unique call number.  You find the call number on the bottom of the screen in our catalog.  You need the entire number to find the book.

Citation - Information about a source that contains the author, year of publication, volume number, page numbers, title of periodical, etc. A periodical index or database will provide a list of citations. The library catalog gives a list of citations of books. Your bibliography will be a list of citations of sources you used for your paper.

Copyright - According to the United States Copyright Office in the Library of Congress, copyright is "a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works." Copyright law protects both published and unpublished information (http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html#wci).

Database -  "An organized collection of information, data, or citations stored in electronic format that can be searched for specific information or records by techniques specific to each database." -from the University of Texas, San Antonio Library.  Examples of scholarly databases are ATLAS, JSTOR, and the Humanities Index.

Full Text - The entire text of the article (or other document) is available from the database, ready to print from your computer.

Journal - A periodical containing a collection of articles, usually written by scholars, presenting information in a particular area. Examples:  Buddhist-Christian StudiesCatholic World, Hinduism Today, Jewish Journal etc.

Literature Review -  A summary and evaluation of the important works that have been written on a given topic.  This is usually the first part of a paper and indicates that the author is building on previous knowledge.

Plagiarism - Taking information from another source and passing it off as your own. This may be done by not giving credit for a quote or a passage of information or by deliberately copying a written work or downloading a paper from the Internet.

Reserves - An item that has been selected by your instructor for you to read. The items are located in our circulation area.  You check them out, but can generally use them only in the library for a few hours.  Careful, there are fines for late return!

Scholarly Journal - Also referred to as "Peer-Reviewed" or "Refereed," a scholarly journal features articles that usually contain original research (qualitative or quantitative), citations of other works, and have been reviewed and selected by other scholars in order to be published.

Source or Resource - This can be a book, a journal article, a video, a website, a CD etc.  We distinguish between primary and secondary sources.




Use these tools for help with researching your topic

For a refresher on how to do library research

go to  Painless Library Research

To evaluate what you find on the Web

go to Evaluating Web Resources  (from Widener University).  Look in the left-hand column under "evaluate web pages" for relevant links.
If you want to learn this and have some fun at the same time, check out the Internet Detective

To recognize and avoid plagiarism

work with these sites:
Plagiarism, its nature and consequences (from Duke University Libraries)
Plagiarism, what it is and how to recognize and avoid it (from Indiana University)

To get books and journal articles from other libraries

use our Interlibrary Loan Service.  It works like this:

If you need a journal article, check first if we have it.  Go to Journal Finder to do this.
If there is no access to the journal, go to the library homepage.
Select Library Services, then Interlibrary Loan.  You will find two request forms, one for books and the other for journal articles.  Fill out the journal articles form.

If you need a book, go to WorldCat
Type in the title of the book.
Look for the ILL icon on the screen, on the upper left-hand banner.  A template will appear.  Fill in your personal information and submit.

Note that it may take one week or longer for the materials to get here. 
Also, make sure you do not have any overdue books or outstanding fines.  Everything must be cleared up before interlibrary loan requests are processed.

To cite your sources in MLA style

Use the online guide from Duke University Library

or  the  Landmark Citation Machine.


Web resources on your topic

People:
 
www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/sixties/blmtn.html  (Black Mountain Poets)  
http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/olson/olson.htm (Charles Olson)
http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/cage/ (John Cage)
http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/creeley/  (Robert Creeley)
http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=8A01F6DD-BBCF-11D4-A93500D0B7069B40   (Ray Johnson)
http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/g_l/levertov/levertov.htm  (Denise Levertov)
http://the-artists.org/artist/Robert_Rauschenberg.html  (Robert Rauschenberg)
http://www.kqed.org/arts/people/spark/profile.jsp?id=4655  (Article on Merce Cummingham)
http://www.designmuseum.org/design/r-buckminster-fuller  (Biography of Buckminster Fuller)

Biographical Information:

Biography Resource Center

Organizations:

www.blackmountaincollege.org  (Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center)  
www.bmcproject.org  (Black Mountain College Project) 
http://www.awsna.org/   (Association of Waldorf Schools of North America website)
http://www.waldorfanswers.org/  (More on Waldorf education)
http://www.workcolleges.org/   (Work Colleges Consortium website)
http://www.antioch.edu/  (Antioch University website)
http://www.goddard.edu/  (Goddard College website)

On Education:

http://www.warren-wilson.edu/~library/eduweb2.htm
Here you can find links to Montessori websites.


To find books on your topic

MCLN Catalog
WWC E-Books
WorldCat


To find journal articles on your topic

The databases listed below are a good start.

These are big, full-text databases that cover all subjects.  You must specify that you want to retrieve only peer-reviewed, scholarly articles. 

Academic Search Premier
Proquest Research Library
MasterFILE Premier
JSTOR
Everything in this database is peer-reviewed and scholarly.

Also of interest are the
Chronicle of Higher Education
and the Education database ERIC.



Selected Reference books

Encyclopedia of Education     R 370.3 E56 2003
    This source has articles on experiential education, alternative schooling,
    John A. Rice and Black Mountain College, and Rudoph Steiner.

Leaning Theories   R 370.3 L581L  2002
    This source has information on experiential learning.


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This page is created and updated by Chris Nugent, with research assistance from Laura Krueger.
Last updated:  October 15, 2007