Readings:

Clark, Chap. 8 "Writing in the Disciplines"

1)  Many students who come to college are very confused about the idea of having to document sources using a specific documentation style.  Think back to your transition from high school to college.  Were you prepared to write an academic essay using one of the three documentation syles:  MLA, APA, or Chicago style?  Did you know what these were?  Did you know how to integrate sources into a paper and to use in-text citation?

In other words, what was your experience moving from high school research expectations to college-level research expectations?  What do you wish someone had told you about this when you came to college?

2)  Is there just one style of academic writing in a university?  Which styles of writing across the disciplines have you been exposed to?  What differences have you discovered among the different disciplines regarding writing expectations?

3)  Only Online students complete this #3 on the SG.  On Campus students will do this in class.

I have discovered that many students, even juniors and seniors, don't know how to do serious research using the search engines available in Pierce Library.  Many students are afraid of libraries and often don't know how to use the services available.

To that end, I want to make sure all of the students who take this class leave here with some library research skills because we often have to help students learn to research to find credible and current sources for their papers. 

So to that end, I want you to do the following excercise:

1) Go to the EOU. Pierce Library website (you can access from Blackboard)

Note:  When the cite asks for it, enter your barcode (each term online students are sent a barcode by email).  For the password, you establish this the first time you use this service.  If you have any problems, contact Shirley Roberts at (541) 962-3520.

2) Click on "Find Journal/Newspaper Articles"

3) Click on "By Database Subject or Name"

Here you will find a list of databases that our library pays for so that we can find current research on chosen topics. 

(Books are fine, but by the time a book is published, many more articles have been written in journals that move forward on the topic.  What many students do not realize is that educators and professionals all over the world are researching and writing articles for the journals in their fields. 

These are juried publications that require that the writers meet the expectations of academic research by providing documentation of their work (works cited or reference pages).  There is a wealth of information available in full-text online that used to be available only in hard copy journals that were not readily available. 

When I was a graduate student, I used to have to physically go to a library and spend hours and days searching out credible academic and professional research articles that I can now find in minutes through the online search engine service that Pierce Library pays a lot of money for to make this research more accessible to you.)

4)  We will practice with one of the best search engines, "Academic Search Premier."  So click on this link.

Now we are going to pretend we are sitting at a computer with Alison helping her expand her research on the topic of "political correctness."

5) In the first field type "political correctness" and select the Subject field to the right.

Note that selecting the best terms for these boxes is like being a detective.  We at first guess at the best words to use, but we might not be using the words that those who are paid to categorize all of the journal articles are using.  So we need to be willing to play with terms and ask reference librarians for help.  (For example, if I am looking for material on small towns, I might need to use the word "rural" as a subject term.)

6)  In the boxes below on that page, check "Full text."  In "Document Type," check "All."  To the right, check the box that says "PDF Full Text."

We are thus telling the search engine that we want only articles that provide full text.

7) Now click on "Search."

8)  Ah ha!  Look at all of the articles available!  This means we used a good term in the search engine subject box.

Now we teach Alison to scroll down, reading the titles and abstracts until we find ones that fit her topic. We explain that this part takes time.  We need to be willing to look at each selection to find those that fit her interest in exploring the good and bad of the movement (since we have already explained that an academic essay on this topic cannot just look at one side). 

So now look through the first few pages of documents.  Select two. Each time you select, look at the Subject terms to see if there are not other terms we can use in our search.  Each time select "PDF Full Text." 

Note:  Each time go up to the "Email" icon and email the article to yourself.  Note that on the email page you can select at the right which documentation style you want for your Works Cited page.  Select MLA.

When you receive this in your email, it will be a whole lot of confusing text.  Look for the link that says "permanent link" in the email and click on that.  The full article should come up.

Your task:  

Provide the Works Cited information for your two articles below as it would appear on an MLA Works Cited page.  

Then explain how Alison might use these articles in her paper.

 

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