I must say the last few weeks do seem to have flown by, and what a journey MARVELous Maine has taken me on!!!! Thank you!!! It is very hard for me to narrow in on the biggest discovery, but I can tell you I am simply amazed at how muvh MARVEL has to offer. Personally, I will continue using the Hobbies & Crafts, Medline Plus, and even will get back to the public library to dabble with Ancestry.com!!!! And, despite the difficulty I had with Business Resources, I am glad I conquered the assignment.
I have already promoted Novelist with the fifth-grade and will continue to promote it. I also intend to use Britannica at all levels.
Again, thank you for offering this as an online opportunity!!!
Marveling and Confused
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Friday, December 7, 2012
Week 10: EbscoHost Family of Databases and Ebsco eBooks
'Tis the season to feel frazzled, fa, la, la, la, la. . . I am just now, on Friday, finding the time to sit down to blog my findings from the homework I did on Tuesday. When on the Marvel site, I chose EbscoHost from the list and discovered nearly 30 databases available with a wide variety of subjects to choose from. I selected the Primary search as it seemed the most likely to benefit the elementary clientele that I service. When I clicked on publications, there were no magazines listed, I found the first listings to be bibliographic records of people starting with A.A. Milne, Abigail Adams, and the Abolition of Slavery and Several Acts (I skimmed through all the way to "G" and tried this twice and thought I had made a mistake but when I tried a second time had the same results). The material did not seem to be written for elementary level either and not what Marvelous Maine described for the Primary search. I'm unsure whether it was me.
When clicking the basic search and typing in zinc, there were 25 resources available. The following listings answered the question regarding what foods contained zinc: #3 Zinc referenced in Minerals in Human Nutrition (2/6/2006) and #14 Powerful Foods to Pack on Your Plate from Girl's Life (Oct/Nov 2005). Both articles listed red meat and the first included fish and oatmeal as well. Options for HTML and PDF files were available.
I did check out a couple other blogs and left comments. Their input was very interesting.
When researching Ebsco eBooks, I chose blood clots, due to the fact my sister has been weeks now dealing with a blood clot in her leg that developed from a surgery. I located articles from Prescription Alternatives, Colon Rectal Cancer, Leukemia, Gynecological Source Book, Type II Diabetic Woman to a Thyroid Source Book, but nothing seemed to target my need.
When searching Constitution Day - 15 results surfaced but when skimming down through the titles, I am not sure they all pertained and am unsure of their connections (and to be frank cannot take the time to explore). The French Revolution, Democracy at Dawn: Noted From Poland and Points East, The Historical Dictionary of Pakistan, Country Roads of Virginia, etc., and Arboriculture were all listed.
In NetLibrary, doing the advanced search, I decided to explore Nebraska. I found Historic Trails, American View: Their Dustbowl Experience, Westward the Immigrants, Field Crop Diseases as well as a couple eBooks about Omaha Indians (there were a few articles listed here as well that I do not know what they have to do with Nebraska, such as, Hydrocephalus, Financial Aid for African Americans and Teach Your Child Math). I delved deeper into the eBook titled Sweet Medicine which gave insight into the Cheyenne Indian tribe.
We are very fortunate to have access to such a wealth of information that Marvel offers!!!!!
When clicking the basic search and typing in zinc, there were 25 resources available. The following listings answered the question regarding what foods contained zinc: #3 Zinc referenced in Minerals in Human Nutrition (2/6/2006) and #14 Powerful Foods to Pack on Your Plate from Girl's Life (Oct/Nov 2005). Both articles listed red meat and the first included fish and oatmeal as well. Options for HTML and PDF files were available.
I did check out a couple other blogs and left comments. Their input was very interesting.
When researching Ebsco eBooks, I chose blood clots, due to the fact my sister has been weeks now dealing with a blood clot in her leg that developed from a surgery. I located articles from Prescription Alternatives, Colon Rectal Cancer, Leukemia, Gynecological Source Book, Type II Diabetic Woman to a Thyroid Source Book, but nothing seemed to target my need.
When searching Constitution Day - 15 results surfaced but when skimming down through the titles, I am not sure they all pertained and am unsure of their connections (and to be frank cannot take the time to explore). The French Revolution, Democracy at Dawn: Noted From Poland and Points East, The Historical Dictionary of Pakistan, Country Roads of Virginia, etc., and Arboriculture were all listed.
In NetLibrary, doing the advanced search, I decided to explore Nebraska. I found Historic Trails, American View: Their Dustbowl Experience, Westward the Immigrants, Field Crop Diseases as well as a couple eBooks about Omaha Indians (there were a few articles listed here as well that I do not know what they have to do with Nebraska, such as, Hydrocephalus, Financial Aid for African Americans and Teach Your Child Math). I delved deeper into the eBook titled Sweet Medicine which gave insight into the Cheyenne Indian tribe.
We are very fortunate to have access to such a wealth of information that Marvel offers!!!!!
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Week 9: Learning Express
I found it very easy to set up an account in Learning Express. There were several tabs down the left-hand column of the page with the following sections: Elementary, Middle School, High School, College, Popular Software Tutorials (which included Adobe, Microsoft and Windows based courses), GED Prep, Job Search, Job Careers, Skill Building for Adults (this included Math & Reasoning, Personal Finance Skills, Public Speaking, Reading, Science, Statistics, Trigonometry, Writing & Grammar Skills Improvement), and U.S Citizenship!
Not because it is a strength (because math is my weakness. . . I'm a literary girl), but knowing our students have a need to boost their test scores, I opted to check out the 4th-grade Assessments. There were a wide range of skill assessments to choose from which all seem to be aligned with topics learned in forth-grade. I opted to try the Math Diagnostic Geometry. The test had 15 questions and included nice graphs. Upon completion, I clicked "View Answers". Much to my embarrassment, I discovered I need to refresh myself on the word 'perpendicular' and couldn't remember the method for reading the coordinate grid. I found myself with a 50/50 shot at whether you start up and to the right, or vise versa. Well sorry to say, I guessed wrong! The good thing that came from my errors, was the opportunity to discover which questions you got wrong and each question came with a detailed explanation. I think these tests would be very beneficial to our 4th and 5th grade students!!!!
When clicking on Job Search and Workplace Skills I noticed the topics to choose from were, Business Writing, Job Search, Resumes, and Interviewing, WorkKeys Preparation and TOEIC Preparation (the last two choices were practice tests for people taking TOEIC and WorkKeys Applied Math Assessments). I chose Job Search, Resumes, and Interviewing. I discovered whole host of helpful information including conversations you might have in an interview, determining what you might want from your career, job search and networking skills, how to succeed in the workplace, and social networking. Also, offered was how to create great resumes and cover letters. I typed marketing in the search box and found 12 test items, 1 course, and 16 eBooks. I selected Search Smart and Get Ahead as my eBook. My book had 20 chapters and 219 pages on business research. Many of the chapters dealt with methods you might use to obtain information (phone interviews, Internet, library, etc) as well as what to do with data collected and how to give a presentation.
This was an informative assignment that I will sure to share with teachers at our school!!!
Not because it is a strength (because math is my weakness. . . I'm a literary girl), but knowing our students have a need to boost their test scores, I opted to check out the 4th-grade Assessments. There were a wide range of skill assessments to choose from which all seem to be aligned with topics learned in forth-grade. I opted to try the Math Diagnostic Geometry. The test had 15 questions and included nice graphs. Upon completion, I clicked "View Answers". Much to my embarrassment, I discovered I need to refresh myself on the word 'perpendicular' and couldn't remember the method for reading the coordinate grid. I found myself with a 50/50 shot at whether you start up and to the right, or vise versa. Well sorry to say, I guessed wrong! The good thing that came from my errors, was the opportunity to discover which questions you got wrong and each question came with a detailed explanation. I think these tests would be very beneficial to our 4th and 5th grade students!!!!
When clicking on Job Search and Workplace Skills I noticed the topics to choose from were, Business Writing, Job Search, Resumes, and Interviewing, WorkKeys Preparation and TOEIC Preparation (the last two choices were practice tests for people taking TOEIC and WorkKeys Applied Math Assessments). I chose Job Search, Resumes, and Interviewing. I discovered whole host of helpful information including conversations you might have in an interview, determining what you might want from your career, job search and networking skills, how to succeed in the workplace, and social networking. Also, offered was how to create great resumes and cover letters. I typed marketing in the search box and found 12 test items, 1 course, and 16 eBooks. I selected Search Smart and Get Ahead as my eBook. My book had 20 chapters and 219 pages on business research. Many of the chapters dealt with methods you might use to obtain information (phone interviews, Internet, library, etc) as well as what to do with data collected and how to give a presentation.
This was an informative assignment that I will sure to share with teachers at our school!!!
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Week 8: Genealogy Resources - Ancestry Library
Between bronchitis, the holiday, and the fact I was relishing a five-day break, I must say, I became a bit disgruntled to discover I was unable to access the Ancestry site from home. However, it all turned out for the best in the end (although I am now catching up on last week's assignment). Yesterday, after school, I drove into Treat Memorial Library. As I was parking, who came whizzing by me for a parking spot? My cohort from the middle school. We actually were seated at adjacent computers by the head librarian, who also happens to be taking this class!!!
When I typed in my name, birthday, etc., I found no results. However, loving a mystery and thinking that perhaps my former married name might bring something. Well, there I was in three listings. One had me there at an address I had never lived, but the other two showed all three addresses I had lived in Wilton (I lived in the same house for 33 years and the address kept changing). I'm thinking it is time for an update as I remarried 5 and a half years ago and have lived in my new home now for almost seven years!
I chose to insert the name of my paternal grandfather and discovered a 1940 United States Census record. I quickly saw he was the second one listed by the name of his spouse, my grandmother. I guess I didn't know they lived in New Vineyard back then (but I'll be sure to let my little brother know as he just happened to move there a few years ago). I was a bit horrified to discover my grandfather was 38 and my grandmother 23, a 15 year difference in age. More horrifying was the realization that she had given birth to 6 children (only five were listed, but I was recently made aware there had been a baby who died very young) and the oldest was nine. One of the most dear people in my life had given birth at the age of 14. The birthdays, years, ages, and names were all listed and you could actually click to see who the neighbors were that lived in their neighborhood! This was very cool and I got a bit side tracked and looked for my maternal grandparents as well.
When performing the search under the "Photos and Maps" tab and typing in Maine as the keyword, 212,144,029 results were found. There were 17 links for Professional Baseball Players and School Yearbooks listed first. In hopes of finding my my maternal grandparents in a Livermore Falls Banner, I found numerous volumes (several were the multiple copies of same years) but nothing before 1949. The grab and zoom feature to view contents was cool. but it was through a great deal of trail and error to figure some of it out!
I was very grateful to have my cohort beside me as we continued to bounce off each other, and together we did a very nice job learning to navigate and discover (and we didn't get kicked out for being too noisy :).
In closing, I am very glad we had this assignment and that I didn't opt out. It was fun, and I was extremely impressed with Ancestry.com (and if I win the Power Ball tonight, I just might become a member)!!!
When I typed in my name, birthday, etc., I found no results. However, loving a mystery and thinking that perhaps my former married name might bring something. Well, there I was in three listings. One had me there at an address I had never lived, but the other two showed all three addresses I had lived in Wilton (I lived in the same house for 33 years and the address kept changing). I'm thinking it is time for an update as I remarried 5 and a half years ago and have lived in my new home now for almost seven years!
I chose to insert the name of my paternal grandfather and discovered a 1940 United States Census record. I quickly saw he was the second one listed by the name of his spouse, my grandmother. I guess I didn't know they lived in New Vineyard back then (but I'll be sure to let my little brother know as he just happened to move there a few years ago). I was a bit horrified to discover my grandfather was 38 and my grandmother 23, a 15 year difference in age. More horrifying was the realization that she had given birth to 6 children (only five were listed, but I was recently made aware there had been a baby who died very young) and the oldest was nine. One of the most dear people in my life had given birth at the age of 14. The birthdays, years, ages, and names were all listed and you could actually click to see who the neighbors were that lived in their neighborhood! This was very cool and I got a bit side tracked and looked for my maternal grandparents as well.
When performing the search under the "Photos and Maps" tab and typing in Maine as the keyword, 212,144,029 results were found. There were 17 links for Professional Baseball Players and School Yearbooks listed first. In hopes of finding my my maternal grandparents in a Livermore Falls Banner, I found numerous volumes (several were the multiple copies of same years) but nothing before 1949. The grab and zoom feature to view contents was cool. but it was through a great deal of trail and error to figure some of it out!
I was very grateful to have my cohort beside me as we continued to bounce off each other, and together we did a very nice job learning to navigate and discover (and we didn't get kicked out for being too noisy :).
In closing, I am very glad we had this assignment and that I didn't opt out. It was fun, and I was extremely impressed with Ancestry.com (and if I win the Power Ball tonight, I just might become a member)!!!
Friday, November 16, 2012
Week 7 Consumer Health Resources: Health Source Consumer Edition and Medline Plus
I must say I found this
week’s assignment much more interesting!!!
Actually, I found myself exploring more than I needed too!!!
In Health Source I
discovered many, many magazines and journals that covered a wide array of
health topics. The interface was easy
as it is the same as the other Ebsco databases we have been using. I searched for high cholesterol. When sorting for the most current
publication, I located an article titled, The Stinking Rose, and was published
November 2012, in Better Nutrition. It
was very easy to understand and discussed information that linked eating garlic
or taking garlic supplements to reduce cholesterol levels. It even included recipes (that I printed)!
From there I
ventured to Medline Plus where I found myself absorbed in all it had to
offer. I loved the eye catching
interface and found it very fun to use.
I particularly liked the fact you had the Senior, Men, Women, and Children tabs to quickly get to issues that were geared to you. The Health News in the column to the right had three articles listed, For
Cholesterol Tests, Fasting May Not Be Required (now wouldn’t THAT be a plus
J), Scientists Find Gene Differences In
Non-Smokers With Lung Cancer, and Spinal Steroid Shots May Have Little
Effect on Sciatica. There was also a handy More Health News Link to
continue searching for more current health news. To the left was Medical Dictionary where you could simply type in
the term for the definition and a Popular Search box which was done in the form
of a Wordle included aspirin, asthma, diabetes, hypertension, multiple
sclerosis, osteoporosis, pneumonia, prednisone, and shingles.
As you may have
guessed, I suffer from having high cholesterol. Two years ago, my results of a fasting blood work showed my
cholesterol level at 307 and came with a prescription for Lipitor. I learned it was a statin drug that is used,
not only to decrease the amount of cholesterol found in your blood but also, to
decrease the risk of heart attacks.
There was a whole host if information from how to use it, why it is
used, precautions to follow and special dietary instructions, side effects, how
to store it, what to do in the event of an overdose and other pertinent
information related to its consumption.
This database
seemed to have more to offer than Health Source. I again plugged in high Cholesterol. Not only was there the ability refine my search better, but the were
great graphs and very informative videos to watch. There were 1, 673 resources and 57 videos! I am almost ashamed to say, I really did not
understand the whole cholesterol issue well.
I chose the video Managing Cholesterol by X-Plain Patient Education.
The material was very clear to help someone understand what cholesterol is and
how to control levels. There was audio
which read the displayed text (which is perfect for all learning styles) and
nice animated graphics. The topics
consisted of causes, diagnosis, treatment options, diets, medications, and
other important information. There were
helpful hints to remember the difference between LDL and HDL and quizzes after
each screen that forced you to return and review before you could proceed, to
ensure you knew the material. Then to
be sure you got it, at the end was a Test You Knowledge test.
I have such a better understanding that I
decided I’d better deal with the third friendly reminder that I had received
from my doctor and have scheduled an appointment to get my fasting blood work
on Tuesday!!!
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Week 6 Business Resources: A.K.A. The "B" Word
@#3%! AAAHHHHGGGGG!!!!
I feel like the MARVELous Maine Invitational has pushed me off a cliff
and I landed in a very unfamiliar territory!!!
My husband and I owned a restaurant and rental property. After several
nightmares associated with the landlord role, I am happy to say, I can cross
that off my bucket list. I loved the
people interaction associated with owning a restaurant and am not ashamed to
admit my husband has the business brains in the family. I remember one morning he asked me how many
waffles we had in the freezer. I
proceeded to say it depended whether he wanted blueberry or plain. He simply smiled and stated, “I want a
number, and you want to tell a story!”
It was perfect affirmation, I was in the right job as a children’s
librarian. Then, this week, the ugly
“B” word (business) reared its ugly head.
I do want to state I have loved the journey the MARVELous Maine
Invitation has taken me. Up until this
week, I have found the assignments interesting and very useful with my
students. Being in a Pre-K through 5th-grade
school, I have never, and probably will ever, have a patron inquire for any
these resources but do appreciate there are fellow public librarians here that
this may be very useful to them and their patrons.
It was a very rough start to complete this week’s
exercises. I spent hours struggling
with what seemed a disconnect from the piece stating Academic Search Complete
will be covered in Lesson 10 and how to get to the Business and Resource
Center. It wasn’t until mid-week when I
sought out a colleague who asked me if I had received the email stating it had
been deleted from the server.
Unfortunately for me, I hadn’t checked my email since the homework was
posted and I had been using the initial guide.
When searching FM radio using Business
Source Complete. There were
several source types of available for a search. I found the visual search not
only much more appealing to the naked eye, but the display options a nice
feature. You were able to change the
display to a Columns or Block; I found the Block Style more to my liking as the
blocks contained time-saving short blurbs.
You could quickly and easily scroll across and down to locate articles
of interest. If something caught your
eye, by clicking, more information would appear in the Summary box. The Filter by Date or Sort by Relevance
options two other helpful features.
After typing Small Business in EconLit, I quickly discovered numerous resources pertaining to
analyses, taxes and tax code information, owner sacrifice, financing and
financial policies, risks, and investments.
When typing in EPA I found one article titled, Land Recycling,
Community Revitalization, and Distributive Policies. Interestingly, though, when I typed out the
entire name Environmental Protection Agency, I noticed an alert that my
‘initial search query did not yield any results. However, using SmartText searching results were found based on my
key words’ and discovered two different articles Climate Policies in the
United States and Japan and The Politics of Market-Based Environmental
Regulation. The options to save in
HTLM or PDF was a nice addition. When completing the advanced search that
pertained to tax policy , I noticed information was categorized into 10
sections from Business Taxes and Subsidies, Fiscal Policies, Taxation Subsidies
and Review-General, State and Local Taxation, Personal Income and Other
Non-Business Taxes and Subsidies Including Inheritance Tax, to name a few. The site offered a box rating system and a
space to save, print or email.
When exploring what Regional Business News
had to offer, I chose McDonald’s as my nationally known company. Not surprisingly, I discovered there were
5,252 results. When I narrowed my
search by typing in Maine, I quickly spied an article titled Fast Food Deal
Gives Maine Potato a Lift but found myself a bit disappointed that only an
abridged abstract was offered and I was unable to view it in its entirety. For the Maine Company, I chose one of the
companies my husband is the Chief Financial Officer (or something like that),
ME Energy Systems. They sell wood
pellet boilers and deliver pellets as well.
I was a bit disappointed to discover they were not listed, but with
added exploration did discover several resources pertaining to devices for
renewable and alternative energy and an article about pellets taking aim at
fuel costs!
The description of Value Line offered a
nice overview of what was behind ‘door #5’!
The Ratings and Reports section showed 133 companies listed
alphabetically and gave the option of changing the view by Industry too! It showed their Ticker, which for lack of a
better explanation, is the abbreviation know by stock marketers. The gave stock market
closing averages, Portfolio offered information of stocks with above average
year ahead price potential, Portfolio II offer information on Stocks for Income
and Potential Price Potential, Portfolio III Stocks with long-term Growth
Potential, Portfolio IV listed companies by stock with above-average dividend
yields. There were other listings of
Information of Growth Stocks with Low Risk, Timely Sticks with Low Risk, Income
Stocks with Good Total Return Potential, Stocks For Dividend Growth with Low
Risk. Also, included were great graphs
of Select Yields, Federal Reserve Data, Tracking the Economy, Major Inside
Transaction, market Monitor and Stock Market Averages. Under Summary and Index Support there were Investment Surveys. The Std
R&R Cover Page consisted of Ratings and Reports and the Std. R&R
Supplementary offered the most current and detailed performance reports of
stock investment surveys. When using
the Value Line Tabs, I found many resources available but was unable to figure
out how to locate a full research report from there.
Wall Street Journal I
discovered numerous articles with my keywords highlighted in the description
that might be of interest to the small businessperson. Much pertained to insurance and health care
laws which would be good information to be aware of. The alert was very cool.
You are able to personally design and define the content as well as how
often you like to receive the alerts and when you’d like to terminate.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Week 5: NoveList Plus
NoveList Plus was a wonderful discovery!!! In my exploration, I quickly discovered how easy and user friendly this database was. First, I searched by author, my personal favorite, James Patterson, who crafts extremely compelling psychological suspense novels. I then decided to delve deeper and searched using the Alex Cross series. I loved the fact, one could easily figure out the order each of the 28 books came in the series. The opportunity to delve deeper by using tabs to read reviews, the More About This Book, Lists and Articles, were also very helpful and may be beneficial to someone who might be on the fence about a particular book. The Read-a-like column was also a great feature and will ease the pain for that student (or anyone) who just can't seem to find what they want to read. The experience created such excitement, I decided to show it to a few teachers and weaved it into the fifth-grade library classes this week! Using a whole group approach, and our Tanberg unit, it was wonderful to see the exitment and the large number of students so eager to suggest authors and series for direction in their next choices. They loved it! A big thanks to our media specialist who put NoveList on our library main page for easy access. I plan to give students time to use this independently at the computers in the library.
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