Well, this is the final week of the Library Challenge, the wrap-up! I learned a ton of new things. I think my biggest discovery was Archive Grid. I didn't even know that such a thing existed, and I love the thought of being able to find the location of really important papers that could be helpful with research. Someday when we get our own archives organized I would love to see our items added to it. Seems like a lot of places have papers that could be very useful to someone somewhere, if only that person knew they existed.
One of the other things I really enjoyed learning about was some of the "extras" on some of the sites. Most of the sites I had used before, but only the basic functions. I liked CAMIO's ability to make your own gallery of images and do comparisons. I liked the photos and maps features of several of the sites, and the foreign language feature was a plus when available. I also liked the sites that had lots of links to more information, and that would sort the information into type for you so you didn't need to look at types that didn't work for your research needs.
I will enjoy knowing more about all of these resources, so I can help the students answer their questions and do their research better. One of the biggest challenges these days is "weeding out" the irrelevant information to avoid overload. I think all of these resources have great features that allow that much better than a general Google search or similar search.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Thursday, August 26, 2010
South Dakota Library Challenge, Lesson 9
For lesson 9 we were looking at AncestryLibrary, HeritageQuest and Sanborn Maps.
I started with AncestryLibrary, looking up my own name. I tried looking under my maiden name, and found some public records with addresses and phone numbers of places I had lived. Under my married name I found my kids' birth records as well as more addresses and phone numbers where I had lived. Sort of a mini-history of my own life. Also popping up were plenty of relatives, as I did not do an "exact search" (well, I tried, but got no results!) so names similar to mine were coming up. Next I tried a search for my grandmother. I found her in the Social Security Death Index. I was kind of surprised that her social security number was right there. I'm hoping that there are some kind of safeguards in place to prevent use of the numbers of deceased people, since I also found her full obituary with all the other info you would need to steal identities. It had information even I didn't know (who knew her middle name was Leota? Not me!) and names of lots of relatives. This would be very useful for genealogy....it would be a good start for working your way back and back. I even found a census record from 1910 with my great-grandmother in it.
Next I looked in the Photos & Maps section of Ancestry Library. When I typed in South Dakota, all kinds of neat things came up. The Library of Congress had lots of photos, like one of the Corn Palace in 1909 when it was actually a corn palace. There were also family photos, professional baseball players from South Dakota (!), US School Yearbooks, and "General Photographs of the Bureau of Ships". Tons of great photos with lots of historical relevance.
When I tried Heritage Quest, I didn't have nearly as much luck. I searched for "Mayflower Descendants", wanting to see if they had one of the books about Mayflower Descendants in South Dakota, which my grandmother is in. No luck. I searched for Aberdeen, Watertown, and Brown County, all with no results. When I tried Brookings, I did get 6 results. 2 were actual histories of Brookings and the area, and the others were family histories by a Brookings author. I was kind of hoping to see more.
Sanborn Maps was interesting. I chose June 1912 for Aberdeen. We happen to have an original of this actual Sanborn Map in our library, so it was interesting to see what it looked like online compared to the real thing. Pretty similar, actually. I looked up the Ward Hotel, and it was there then as it still is now, but of course almost everything around it had changed. It was interesting to see how different everything is now....the one consistency throughout the town is the railroad.
These are all good resources, and would be especially useful to our upper-level history students, who every year have to choose a topic of local history interest and write a research paper. These sources could all be very helpful for that type of paper. They are also excellent for genealogy research. And if you wanted to find your own address from 1989, you can do that too!
I started with AncestryLibrary, looking up my own name. I tried looking under my maiden name, and found some public records with addresses and phone numbers of places I had lived. Under my married name I found my kids' birth records as well as more addresses and phone numbers where I had lived. Sort of a mini-history of my own life. Also popping up were plenty of relatives, as I did not do an "exact search" (well, I tried, but got no results!) so names similar to mine were coming up. Next I tried a search for my grandmother. I found her in the Social Security Death Index. I was kind of surprised that her social security number was right there. I'm hoping that there are some kind of safeguards in place to prevent use of the numbers of deceased people, since I also found her full obituary with all the other info you would need to steal identities. It had information even I didn't know (who knew her middle name was Leota? Not me!) and names of lots of relatives. This would be very useful for genealogy....it would be a good start for working your way back and back. I even found a census record from 1910 with my great-grandmother in it.
Next I looked in the Photos & Maps section of Ancestry Library. When I typed in South Dakota, all kinds of neat things came up. The Library of Congress had lots of photos, like one of the Corn Palace in 1909 when it was actually a corn palace. There were also family photos, professional baseball players from South Dakota (!), US School Yearbooks, and "General Photographs of the Bureau of Ships". Tons of great photos with lots of historical relevance.
When I tried Heritage Quest, I didn't have nearly as much luck. I searched for "Mayflower Descendants", wanting to see if they had one of the books about Mayflower Descendants in South Dakota, which my grandmother is in. No luck. I searched for Aberdeen, Watertown, and Brown County, all with no results. When I tried Brookings, I did get 6 results. 2 were actual histories of Brookings and the area, and the others were family histories by a Brookings author. I was kind of hoping to see more.
Sanborn Maps was interesting. I chose June 1912 for Aberdeen. We happen to have an original of this actual Sanborn Map in our library, so it was interesting to see what it looked like online compared to the real thing. Pretty similar, actually. I looked up the Ward Hotel, and it was there then as it still is now, but of course almost everything around it had changed. It was interesting to see how different everything is now....the one consistency throughout the town is the railroad.
These are all good resources, and would be especially useful to our upper-level history students, who every year have to choose a topic of local history interest and write a research paper. These sources could all be very helpful for that type of paper. They are also excellent for genealogy research. And if you wanted to find your own address from 1989, you can do that too!
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
South Dakota Library Challenge, Lesson 8
This week's lesson was about Learning Express Library. This site is a great source for test preparation and many other things. I actually used this site quite a bit last fall when I was preparing for my GRE test. There are many sample tests available and I gave them a good workout.
For today's lesson, I tried a practice test for the ACT English section. I only answered a few questions, so of course when I went to score it my score was dismal. It did inform me that my score indicated that I may need more practice for the test, and gave some suggestions for what I should do. I liked how it broke down the score and made it very easy to understand. (GRE scores are very difficult to make sense of, but the ACT was much easier!)
Next I went to the "Job search and interviews" section and chose a course on job interviews. This was a very useful course....it had loads of information. There was information on how to dress, how to make small talk, what type of questions there might be, and even how to follow up after the interview. This would be very useful for someone looking for a job.
I checked out the e-books section and was also very impressed. Lots of books about how to improve study and academic skills in general. I chose a book about "How to write great essays" and really liked the easy format. It was really nice to be able to scroll through the list of books and be able to choose one and view it immediately.
All of these tools are very useful, and I can see that they would be especially useful to someone who doesn't live very close to a library, since they are all accessible online. It is easy to set up an account, and easy to navigate around the site.
For today's lesson, I tried a practice test for the ACT English section. I only answered a few questions, so of course when I went to score it my score was dismal. It did inform me that my score indicated that I may need more practice for the test, and gave some suggestions for what I should do. I liked how it broke down the score and made it very easy to understand. (GRE scores are very difficult to make sense of, but the ACT was much easier!)
Next I went to the "Job search and interviews" section and chose a course on job interviews. This was a very useful course....it had loads of information. There was information on how to dress, how to make small talk, what type of questions there might be, and even how to follow up after the interview. This would be very useful for someone looking for a job.
I checked out the e-books section and was also very impressed. Lots of books about how to improve study and academic skills in general. I chose a book about "How to write great essays" and really liked the easy format. It was really nice to be able to scroll through the list of books and be able to choose one and view it immediately.
All of these tools are very useful, and I can see that they would be especially useful to someone who doesn't live very close to a library, since they are all accessible online. It is easy to set up an account, and easy to navigate around the site.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
South Dakota Library Challenge, Lesson 7
Part 1: Archive Grid
I had never even heard of Archive Grid, so this was a good resource to learn more about. I looked up Sitting Bull, and found the little biography of Sitting Bull. It didn't give a lot of information, but it would be a good starting point to learn more. This link was actually a link to an artifact held by the Cornell University library, a card and envelope autographed by Sitting Bull. I liked the ability to find items in archives this way.
When I did my own search, I looked up Jack the Ripper, a strange little fascination of mine. I wasn't actually expecting to find anything, but I actually got 20 results. Some of them were from the collection of the papers of David Abrahamsen, who wrote an analysis of criminal minds, including Jack the Ripper. There was also a diary in one collection containing references to the Ripper murders. There were also papers in one archives of Cuthbert Druitt, cousin of Montague Druitt, a suspect of the crimes. There were papers of a man who had been a witness at the inquest of one of the Ripper victims. Several links were to movie-related collections, having to do with one of the "Jack the Ripper" films. I was really surprised to see all of these things come up. Some had very detailed lists of items in the collection. One would generally have to actually go to the archives to see the papers and use the information, but just knowing where to find it is a great start if you were deeply researching a certain topic.
Part 2: CAMIO
I did the Paul Revere search, and was pleased to see how many photos of his lovely silver work there were. Some were by Paul Revere and some by Paul Revere, Jr. I am not sure if those are both Paul Revere or if one was his son. There were also some works that popped up that were about Paul Revere, not by him, such as "The Ride of Paul Revere". Each item had a small photo that you could click on to see a bigger image and get more detail about the work.
When I searched under "Sioux", I got nice results as well. Lots of images of Native American artifacts and artwork. There was a wide variety of items.
For my own artist, I chose to search for Georgia O'Keeffe. This was a little difficult because I wasn't sure of the spelling of her name. I typed in Georgia O'Keefe, and got no results at all. Unlike some search engines, it did not come up with an alternative suggestion. I searched again under "Georgia" and this time got lots of results, mostly for Georgia O'Keeffe (Two f's! Who knew? After 4 semesters of art history, you'd think I would!). Once I had the correct spelling I could eliminate all of the non-relevant results.
Our library could use this resource in many ways, the main one being for the art students. I know when I was in school, the professor would assign us to copy a master's work, usually giving us several masters to choose from. It would be nice to be able to look each one up right there and do a comparison of their work to decide on the subject matter. There is also the ability to sort by medium (drawings, watercolor, photos, etc.) so if you're only looking for oil paintings it's sorted for you. You can also save them to favorites, and from there you can do side-by-side comparisons, view them in a slideshow, and move them around into whatever order you want. Very useful resource!
I had never even heard of Archive Grid, so this was a good resource to learn more about. I looked up Sitting Bull, and found the little biography of Sitting Bull. It didn't give a lot of information, but it would be a good starting point to learn more. This link was actually a link to an artifact held by the Cornell University library, a card and envelope autographed by Sitting Bull. I liked the ability to find items in archives this way.
When I did my own search, I looked up Jack the Ripper, a strange little fascination of mine. I wasn't actually expecting to find anything, but I actually got 20 results. Some of them were from the collection of the papers of David Abrahamsen, who wrote an analysis of criminal minds, including Jack the Ripper. There was also a diary in one collection containing references to the Ripper murders. There were also papers in one archives of Cuthbert Druitt, cousin of Montague Druitt, a suspect of the crimes. There were papers of a man who had been a witness at the inquest of one of the Ripper victims. Several links were to movie-related collections, having to do with one of the "Jack the Ripper" films. I was really surprised to see all of these things come up. Some had very detailed lists of items in the collection. One would generally have to actually go to the archives to see the papers and use the information, but just knowing where to find it is a great start if you were deeply researching a certain topic.
Part 2: CAMIO
I did the Paul Revere search, and was pleased to see how many photos of his lovely silver work there were. Some were by Paul Revere and some by Paul Revere, Jr. I am not sure if those are both Paul Revere or if one was his son. There were also some works that popped up that were about Paul Revere, not by him, such as "The Ride of Paul Revere". Each item had a small photo that you could click on to see a bigger image and get more detail about the work.
When I searched under "Sioux", I got nice results as well. Lots of images of Native American artifacts and artwork. There was a wide variety of items.
For my own artist, I chose to search for Georgia O'Keeffe. This was a little difficult because I wasn't sure of the spelling of her name. I typed in Georgia O'Keefe, and got no results at all. Unlike some search engines, it did not come up with an alternative suggestion. I searched again under "Georgia" and this time got lots of results, mostly for Georgia O'Keeffe (Two f's! Who knew? After 4 semesters of art history, you'd think I would!). Once I had the correct spelling I could eliminate all of the non-relevant results.
Our library could use this resource in many ways, the main one being for the art students. I know when I was in school, the professor would assign us to copy a master's work, usually giving us several masters to choose from. It would be nice to be able to look each one up right there and do a comparison of their work to decide on the subject matter. There is also the ability to sort by medium (drawings, watercolor, photos, etc.) so if you're only looking for oil paintings it's sorted for you. You can also save them to favorites, and from there you can do side-by-side comparisons, view them in a slideshow, and move them around into whatever order you want. Very useful resource!
Friday, August 6, 2010
South Dakota Library Challenge Lesson 6
Lesson 6 was about WorldCat, the catalog where you can find just about any book in any library in the world. I chose to search for "The Hobbit" by J.R.R. Tolkien. I got 179 results. This was not too surprising since there's been so many different versions of that book over the years. The top result was a more recent illustrated version, held by 934 libraries. When I clicked on the link to the libraries, it listed all the libraries that have it. The top library was the Brookings Public Library. I liked how the details listed everything, such as size and number of pages, and even showed a photo of the front cover. This would be a great way to make sure you have found the exact book you are looking for. The LC call number was PN6727.D586. It also listed the Dewey call number, 741.5. When I clicked on the author link, it showed a list of his other books, such as the Silmarillion, Lord of the Rings, and the Book of Lost Tales. This would be really nice if you found you liked a particular author and wanted to see a comprehensive listing of that author's books. The subject field was kind of odd for this particular book, listing the subjects as "Middle-Earth" and "Hobbits", both of which are unique to Tolkien's books, so when I clicked on that link I got a listing of Tolkien's other books. If I had chosen a different title, perhaps one about a serial killer, I imagine the subject link would have taken me to other books about serial killers.
When I searched the OAIster database for "South Dakota", I got a listing of articles. I chose "Observations on Bats at Badlands National Park". The best thing about this database is it is all full text, so when you click on the link, it gives you the option to download the article. Once downloaded, it can be printed or just read right on the computer. The article I chose was also text searchable....I don't know if they all are, but it is a great feature. It would enable you to find out right away if the article had particular information. For example, if you were only interested in vampire bats, you could type that into the search and see if the article contained anything on that subject. This is a very useful tool for wading through large amounts of information quickly to weed out the irrelevant.
When I searched the OAIster database for "South Dakota", I got a listing of articles. I chose "Observations on Bats at Badlands National Park". The best thing about this database is it is all full text, so when you click on the link, it gives you the option to download the article. Once downloaded, it can be printed or just read right on the computer. The article I chose was also text searchable....I don't know if they all are, but it is a great feature. It would enable you to find out right away if the article had particular information. For example, if you were only interested in vampire bats, you could type that into the search and see if the article contained anything on that subject. This is a very useful tool for wading through large amounts of information quickly to weed out the irrelevant.
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