Steps
- Assign groups of students a particular database of your choosing.
- Instruct students to watch the tutorial about their database and then spend some time exploring the database. (Here is a list of short video tutorials for commonly used databases. If you don’t see a database you want to use on this list, reach out to a librarian for help finding an appropriate tutorial.)
- Students will then create a brief presentation on their database. I suggest the following prompt, but this can be tweaked to fit your context:
- Each presentation should:
- show the class how to get to the database
- describe what kinds of sources they can find in the database
- demonstrate an example search
- describe one thing you liked about the database or one aspect of it that you think might be useful
- Each presentation should:
- Share a link to a Google slide deck with a slide or slides for each group to fill in.
- Give the students time in class to prepare their presentations or assign it as homework.
- Students present their database to the class in a 5-minute presentation that includes sharing the answers to the prompt questions and a demo search on a topic related to the coursework.
Considerations
- Work with a librarian to select databases that best suit your course or assignment or to find tutorial videos as needed. We are happy to meet with you to make sure you feel comfortable and knowledgeable about the databases you want to encourage your students to use.
- For preliminary research, some databases to consider are: CQ Researcher, Gale eBooks, Opposing Viewpoints in Context, Academic Search Premier, Statista
- To provide an opportunity to compare library databases and search engines consider: Google, Google Scholar
- Check in with the students ahead of their presentations to make sure they have picked up on the most important or unique aspects of their database.
- If you would like to see a librarian run this type of session before trying it out, reach out to us and we can make that happen.