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Skills for University Success

Course Number: AF105S

Subject: English

Introduction

This guide gives you an introduction to the Laurier Library. It will help you find academic sources for assignments.

 

Top 3 Tips for Using the Library

 

TIP #1 Visit!

You'll find lots of study space in the Library, including:

There are many books! Award winners are waiting for you on the selves.

 

TIP #2 Bookmark library.wlu.ca

 

TIP #3 Get help with research

 

Top 5 Tips for Finding Academic Sources

 

TIP #1 Know what they are, and why they're important

  • Your assignments often require you to use academic sources. But why? There are so many different types of sources.

 

JOURNAL ARTICLE FEATURES

 

Description

Published in scholarly journals, share original research about a topic, are written by experts in a field of study, are peer-reviewed by other experts.

 

TIP #2 Where you search matters

 

Different search tools (e.g. Omni - the Library search tool, Google, etc.) are built to do different things.

 

Activity (10 min.)

  1. Copy the following: The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
  2. Paste it into the 3 tools below, and hit search.
    1. Google Scholar
    2. Omni (Library search tool)
    3. MLA International Bibliography (an article database)
  3. Answer these questions:
    • How many results did you get?
    • What are the dates of the first 3 results?

 

TIP #3: Search tactics improve results

 

What is the tactic?

What does the tactic do?

Examples

Phrase searching

Use quotation marks to find more than one term in a row.

"ones who walk away from omelas"

Truncation

Use an asterisk* at the end of a term to include multiple endings.

ethic*

ethic, ethics, ethical, ethically

Boolean AND

Use AND to ensure that all terms appear in every search result.

ethics AND science fiction

Boolean OR

Use OR to ensure that at least one term appears in every search result.

ethics OR morals

 

TIP #4: Choose Sources Strategically

 

Description
  • Start early and read strategically: Read article abstracts first and use a book's table of contents.
  • Can you access it? If not, ask your librarian (mefischer@wlu.ca).
  • What's the publication date? Try to find recent research.
  • Is it original research? Peer-reviewed journals publish different types of articles.
  • What kind of research is it? Are you prepared to work with the research you see?
  • Who are the authors? Are you representing different perspectives in the sources you choose?

 

TIP #5 Work on your reading strategies.