Chesnutt Library Blog

“Because it’s all about ‘U,’” the Chesnutt Library Blog is designed to promptly and efficiently provide timely news, inform of library events, books, databases and more for our students, staff and faculty. In our effort to enhance communication, the Chesnutt Library Blog will bring academic resources together in one place, with one click, with one purpose in mind - Educational Excellence - designed to enhance learning, guarantee access and promote scholarship.

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Database of the Week - Access Science

Did you know it is dangerous to use earbuds to listen to music or use your cell phone in a thunderstorm? The wires in the earbuds can channel electricity from close lightening strikes right into your ear and cause terrible damage.

How do I know this? I read it in Access Science!

From Science News, Vol. 172, No. 3, July 21, 2007, p. 46. Copyright © 2007 Science Service.

Access Science: McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology Online

Access Science is a fun science database filled with tons of information. If you need a science paper topic, or if you’re just curious to see what is happening in the scientific community, this is the place to visit.
Use Access Science to develop your topic, gather background information, and learn key vocabulary terms. Articles have a suggested citation with all the information you need to cite the article correctly. Once you have gathered your background information you will be prepared to search for scholarly journal articles.

Access Science includes:
- full search capabilities of the 9th edition of the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology
- new trends and developments in science and technology ("Research Updates") from the McGraw-Hill Yearbooks of Science & Technology
- access to 110,000+ definitions from The McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms
- Headline News
- Biographies of scientists
- Student Center with Essay Topics, Topical Study Guides, Study guides for Advanced Placement, a weekly Q&A
- Image Gallery
- Links to related web sites
- Choose a Topic to see a list of articles and research updates

Laura Bell Wright, Interlibrary Loan & Reference Librarian

Friday, July 27, 2007

The Changing Information Services Needs of Faculty

This interesting article discusses the findings of several studies conducted in 2006 on the changing needs of faculty in an increasingly digital environment and the role that librarians' play in meeting those needs. The studies "suggest the need for libraries to take leadership in helping academia's transition to the new environment."
Source: Educause, ResourceShelf

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

More New Books

The following titles are located on the 2nd (Main Stacks) of Chesnutt Library:

B Philosophy, Psychology, Religion

Applying the Rasch model: fundamental measurement in the human sciences
[BF39 .B678 2007]

Essentials of behavioral research: methods and data analysis
[BF76.5 .R629 2008]

A historical and contemporary look at psychological systems
[BF81 .P43 2007]

Preventing prejudice: a guide for counselors, educators, and parents
[BF575.P9 P64 2006]

Gaze-following: its development and significance
[BF720.A85 G39 2007]

Vedic astrology simply put: an illustrated guide to the astrology of ancient India
[BF1714.H5 L52 2007]

Home with God: in a life that never ends: a wondrous message of love in a final conversation with God
[BF1999 .W2285 2006]

American gospel: God, the founding fathers, and the making of a nation
[BL2525 .M423 2006]

Malcolm X: a graphic biography
[BP223.z8 L5745 2006]

Tempting faith: an inside story of political seduction
[BR516 .K86 2006]

Messengers: portraits of African American ministers, evangelists, gospel singers, and other messengers of the Word
[BR563.N4 R58 2006]

The Jesus dynasty: the hidden history of Jesus, his royal family, and the birth of Christianity
[BT270 .T33 2006]

Prayer: does it make any difference?
[BV210.3 .Y36 2006]

Crusade of charity: Pius XII and POWs (1939-1945)
[BX1378 .M263 2006]

Monday, July 23, 2007

Free Music Downloads!

The Classical Music Library is now offering free weekly music downloads. Each week they feature a work from the Classical Music Library and make it available for downloading to personal computers, MP3 players, ipods, discs, etc. Just go to http://musicdownloads.alexanderstreet.com/promo/ or follow the promotional link located on the Classical Music Library’s page using the Chesnutt Library’s Database Finder. (If you’re in Chesnutt Library and want to listen to the music, don’t forget your headphones!)

This week’s feature is Mozart’s Don Giovanni.

Database of the Week: Web of Science


The Web of Science provides access to information from approximately 8,700 of the “most prestigious, high impact research journals in the world.” These citations are derived from three databases: Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index, and Arts & Humanities Citation Index. The Web of Science also provides cited reference searching. Cited reference searching allows you to “navigate forward, backward and through the literature searching all disciplines and time spans to uncover all the information relevant to their search.”

Cited Reference Searching

You can find citations to an author by entering the author’s name, entering the abbreviated title of the cited publication (if you don’t know the abbreviated journal title just click the link and a list will be provided) and you can specify the year span (optional). The result of your search is a list of cited references. You can select some or all of the references before clicking Finish Search to retrieve the citing articles. This type of search comes in very handy. For example, in a search for a particular title by Francine Fialkoff that appeared in Library Journal, I typed in “Fialkoff” in the author box and LIBR J (abbreviation for Library Journal) in the publication box and clicked search. I got 19 results. The results list defaults to an abbreviation of the cited works so in order to look at specific article titles you have to select “Show Expanded Titles.” The cited work I’m interested in is titled “Rampant Plagiarism” which has been cited twice. I select it then click “Finish Search.” I then get two cited results:

1. Ercegovac Z, Richardson JV Academic dishonesty, plagiarism included, in the digital age: A literature review COLLEGE & RESEARCH LIBRARIES 65 (4): 301-318 JUL 2004

Times Cited: 0

2. Wood G Academic original sin: Plagiarism, the Internet, and librarians JOURNAL OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIANSHIP 30 (3): 237-242 MAY 2004 Times Cited: 1

The citations also include a Links tab that will take you to Chesnutt Library's Journal Finder to see if the full text article is available (they were). Now I have more relevant resources for my research.

Although I've stressed the Cited Reference Search feature because I think it's great, the Web of Science includes a General Search and an Advanced Search tab. The interface may look a little crowded at first but once you spend a little time with it you'll find it remarkably easy to navigate. The Web of Science also includes tutorials for each search option and the ability to save your search history.

Linette Neal, Reference Librarian

Thursday, July 19, 2007

New Books at Chesnutt Library

The following new books are located on the 3rd floor (Main Stacks) of Chesnutt Library:

Education

Between caring & counting: teachers take on education reforms
[LA418.o6 k47 2006]

Cyril Norwood and the ideal of secondary education
[LA634 .M289 2007]

It doesn't take a genius: five truths to inspire success in every student
[LB1062.6 .M43 2006]

Language and learning: the home and school years
[LB1139.L3 P53 2007]

Handbook for educational leadership interns: a rite of passage
[LB1738.5 .C863 2007]

Revisiting outcomes assessment in higher education
[LB2331.63 .R48 2006]

Leadership in higher education: views from the presidency
[LB2341 .L247 2006]

Presidential transition in higher education
[LB2341 .P747 2006]

Schools and data: the educator's guide for using data to improve decision making
[LB2805 .C737 2007]

The student newspaper survival guide
[LB3621.65 .K36 2006]

The school and community relations
[LC221 .G35 2006]

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Database of the Week - Education Research Complete

Chesnutt library recently added a database of interest for education majors.
EBSCO Host’s Education Research Complete is a comprehensive full text article database which covers all levels of education from early childhood through higher education. Education Research Complete also covers all areas of curriculum instruction as well as administration, policy, funding, and related social issues. The database provides indexing and abstracts for more than 1,500 journals, as well as full text for more than 750 journals. Education Research Complete also includes full text for more than 100 books and monographs, and full text for numerous education-related conference papers. Users can locate a variety of quality referred journal articles on topics such as learning disabilities, educational theories, and multiculturalism. Education Week, Mailbox Teacher, Reading Teacher, Teacher Educator, and Special Education are just some of the many full text periodicals that are available in Education Research Complete. If you are interested in browsing a particular journal, click on the publications tab and type in the name of the journal in the search box.

Some helpful tips for managing your results and creating APA citations for individual articles are below.

- Add an article or citation by clicking on the folder in the record.
- When you are done adding records to the folder, click on the link for Folder has items at the top of the page.
- You can e-mail, print or save citations. Select your preferred method for your documents.
- In the Folder page, options for citation format are located on the second drop-down menu where you can select a particular style, e.g. APA, MLA, etc.
- Depending on which option you selected, click on print, e-mail or save in the left corner.

Denise Bosselman, Bibliographic & Instruction Librarian

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Chesnutt Library's Makeover

We're sure most of you have noticed the latest changes at Chesnutt Library. While renovations are still ongoing and subject to change, we wanted to highlight some of those changes. First and foremost is the library's new carpet:

We've replace these old computer chairs:

With these spiffy new ones:











We've added some comfortable chairs for our study areas:

Including some with a rotating desktop for you to set up your laptop (or your books, of course!):

And in case you've been wondering what these machines are:


They are set up so that you can print ($.08/page) by inserting your floppy, USB flash drive, or a CD. This is especially useful when needing to print but stationed at a non-print computer.

Thank you for your continued patience while the renovations continue. If you have questions or comments please let us know.

Monday, July 09, 2007

New Books at Chesnutt Library

The following new books are located on the 2nd floor of the Chesnutt Library:

Business & Economics

Markets, games, & strategic behavior
[HB74.5 .H65 2007]

Walrasian economics
[HB105.W3 W35 2006]

Mathematical models of economic dynamics with discrete innovations
[HB135 .Z29 2006]

Empirical post Keynesian economics: looking at the real world
[HB171 .E55 2007]

Economics: making sense of the modern economy
[HB171.5 .E33 2006]

African households: censuses and surveys
[HB3661.A3 A344 2006]

America's bubble economy: profit when it pops
[HB3722.W53 2006]

Innovation dynamism and economic growth: a nonlinear perspective
[HC79.T4 H57 2006]

Guide to economic indicators
[HC103 .F9 2006]

Policy analysis for effective development: strengthening transition economies
[HC244 .M625 2006]

China's domestic private firms: multidisciplinary perspectives on management and performance
[HD2346.C6 C4835 2006]

Management information systems: solving business problems with information technology
[HD30.213 .P67 2006]

Decision making with the analytic network process: economic, political, social and technological applications with benefits, opportunities, costs and risks
[HD30.23 .S192323 2006]

Paths to power: how insiders and outsiders shaped American business leadership
[HD38.25.U6 M345 2006]

Strategic management: building and sustaining competitive advantage
[HD30.28 .P528 2006]

Inside the mind of the stakeholder: the hype behind stakeholder pressure
[HD59 .I5577 2006]

The world food economy
[HD1415 .S634 2007]

The Chilean labor market: a key to understanding Latin American labor markets
[HD5756.A6 S44 2006]

America at work: choices and challenges
[HD6957.U5 A485 2006]

Pensions: reform, protection and health insurance
[HD7125 .P394 2006]

Chutes and ladders: navigating the low-wage labor market
[HD8081.A5 N49 2006]

Black males left behind
[HD8081.A65 B53 2006]

The politics of citizenship of Mexican immigrants
[HD8081.M6 C39 2006]

Global pharmaceuticals: ethics, markets, practices
[HD9665.5 .G56 2006]


Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Database of the Week: America History and Life


America: History and Life is a database that provides comprehensive coverage of the United States ad Canada from prehistory to the present. The content in the database includes over 325, 000 articles; 163,000 book reviews and 750 media reviews, which include films shown on the History Channel, the Discovery Channel and PBS. Documentaries and popular films with historical themes are also included. There are over 1100 collections, which are books and book chapters; and 60,000 plus dissertations and theses. There are links to full-text providers such as: EBSCOHost’s database Academic Search Premier; H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online (http://www.h-net.org/reviews/), which provides scholarly reviews of books and media; History Cooperative (http://www.historycooperative.org/journals.html), which contains the full-text of the American Historical Review, the Journal of American History and other journal titles. Full-text can also be accessed by checking in Journal Finder to see if the journal is in full-text in another database, such as Blackwell Synergy.

The database provides a basic search screen and an advanced search screen. The basic search screen provides a choice to search broadly by “Keywords” or to do a more focused search using “Subject Terms.” The subject terms can be browsed directly by clicking on the book symbol. Browsing the subject terms can help a person focus their search on a time period, person, group or specific event in history. Each record in the database contains assigned subject terms which can be selected and searched.

There are several “Search Fields” in the basic search: author, title, language, journal, publication date, time period and entry number. In the “Advanced Search” one can browse not only the “Subject Terms.” but also the “Authors/Editors,” the “Languages,” “Journal Names,” and “Time Periods.” One can also view their “Search History” to see the sets they have created and these search strategies can be saved under a personal profile. Any records that are marked or tagged will be saved under a “Personal List,” for the session’s duration, which can later be displayed, emailed or printed. “Display Options” allows one to change the order in which results are displayed and the number viewed on a screen.

A great feature in the database is the ability to register and create a “Personal Profile. For FSU affiliated persons, your “username” should be your FSU email address (i.e ImABronco@uncfsu.edu). You will then see a screen that allows you to set up your profile and create and store your search strategies, which can then be run in the database. You are also able to export your records into RefWorks, EndNote, ProCite or Reference Manager.

Another great feature in the database is called “CLIO Notes.” This feature provides an easy way for persons using the database to see how content is organized and what available resources there are for the different time periods and events within US History. One is able to browse through these chronologies and read brief summaries of the significant events and themes in American history. The chronology starts with “1493-1700, Colonization of America” to “1980-2001, Entering the 21st Century.” A detailed chronology is provided for each time period. Then there are summative essays, which provide a discussion of what was taking place during the time period and suggestions for papers or further research. For example, “The Colonization of America: Exploration and Settlement: The Spanish” is one such essay. There within the essay is the basic search box, a list of the “Subject Terms” which can be selected and searched, and the material types, which can also be selected.

I urge anyone who is interested in United States and Canadian history to explore the great features provided in America: History and Life.

Jan S. Whitfield,
Head of Public Services and Reference