The British Education Index has moved to a new platform

The British Education Index (BEI), Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) & Australian Education Index (AUEI) have changed supplier. The databases are now provided ProQuest. The previous supplier Dialog DataStar will shut down on 30th November 2011.

To access the databases click here.

The links from the catalogue and the digital library have been updated.

The content is the same but the interface and functionality may take a little time to get used to.



For help searching this database or any education related subject query please contact either Adele or Hilary. Contact details can be found here

Webprint: new service for printing wirelessly

All students can now submit print jobs to campus printers from any PC, Mac, laptop or mobile device via a website or email attachment without the need to install printer drivers.

• Print your work from on or off campus
• Log on to webprint.beds.ac.uk to upload your file
• or email your file to webprint@beds.ac.uk
• Collect your work next time you are on campus

A quick and easy way to print your work from anywhere and collect it anytime you're ready.

Full instruction son how to print are available once you login.  Just choose the type of campus printer you want to collect your work from and collect it at your leisure.

Waterstone's discount

Waterstone's are back in Polhill Library for induction season.  They are offering 12.5% discount on all the books and are able to order in items if they do not have them on display already.

New floor at Polhill Library

The plan had been to have a beautiful new floor installed over the Bank Holiday weekend.  Unfortunately, the contractors have found it has taken longer than expected to lift the old flooring.  So the ground floor is currently a vision in muddy green.  On the upside it's not sticky!



View from the entrance

They are making better progress now and assure us that the new floor will be ready for the new term.

Teachers & librarians of the world unite!

Jessica Hagy's blog is my favourite coffee break treat (especially when Costa runs out of everything - most distressingly chocolate goodness).  Polhill Campus has a large group of Spanish teenagers in this week...

Using Prezi: the 'Big' picture

These are some notes I will be using for the LivTeachMeeting at the University of Liverpool on 26 May 2011.  I am posting them here in case they are useful for anyone else.

Website
http://prezi.com.  The public license version is free.  The minor downside is that you cannot 'lock' your prezis so they are private.  However, you can stop people copying them.

How to create a great Prezi by Adam Somlai-Fischer (one of the original developers)
Excellent prezi which summarises the main features and how to use it successfully
http://prezi.com/vbl7rvw_t7rc/copy-of-how-to-create-a-great-prezi/

Good points

Overviews & connections

Speed to put together

The 'wow' factor

Non-linear
Easy to include images, videos etc
Good on big screens
Cloud storage (no memory stick!)
Sharing with colleagues & clients (Twitter, embedding etc)

Bad points
Motion sickness (if overdone or small screen)
Can look a bit slapdash (eg pixellated images when you)
Site has basic search & no tagging
Needs good browser (updated & Flash)
Not suitable for step-by-step, detailed instruction
Might lose novelty value in future
No automatic handout 

How we use it
All in all it is excellent for 'Welcome' talks during Induction week, outside of the library.  (Vast lecture room; hours of powerpoint presentations; team teaching; quick overview).  Courses include Education, Social Work, PE and Sport. 

I plan to create quick teaser adverts for a resource (like RefWorks or ejournals bundle) to run on auto before and after lectures.
Notetaking - I saw an audience member use this at a Business Link course recently.  They said (1) they were going to cascade to colleagues later and (2) it is really popular with people who don't like text.

 
Some resources
The Learn section of the Prezi website is excellent.  There are cheatsheets and videos.  When they say you can learn it in 10 minutes, they're not kidding!  But these are some of the other resources my team looked at too:-

• Zuilab's Channel on YouTube is also a good source::  http://www.youtube.com/user/zuilabs.
• Prezi for Dummies Cheat Sheet by Stephanie Diamond: dummies.com/how-to/content/prezi-for-dummies-cheat-sheet
• Two page overview.  A Quickstart Guide by RJ Tarr: activehistory.co.uk/Miscellaneous/free_stuff/worksheets/Prezi.pdf

RFID is coming soon

Did you know that if you have requested a Putteridge Bury book in the last year, it came with an RFID tag?  Putteridge was the first library in the University to be converted and this Spring all the other libraries are also making the switch.  The dates and details are set out on this LRWeb's "RFID is coming soon" page.

RFID is used a lot in retail; shops can quickly track what stock is where (M&S use it a lot, apparently).  Your student ID badge is RFID-ed already. In the library sector, RFID is really being introduced to benefit customers.  Basically, instead of having to scan barcodes (either at the self-service machines or at the desk) for each book, RFID machines can read an unopened pile and automatically and issue each item to your card.  Very quick and simple.

It is very popular in other university libraries like UEA, Nottingham and Swansea.  I was going to add a video of a system in operation here but a quick search of YouTube has revealed lots of different machines and kit so I don't want to confuse you with a demonstration of the wrong one!  There will be lots of publicity and help available in the library when the system goes live.

The returns machine outside the library entrance will still be available.

Cambridge Science Festival

The Cambridge Science Festival opens today.  Events are open to the public and there is a varied programme.  For more details follow this link: Cambridge Science Festival 2011.

Teaching resource books

If you have ever wondered how publishers plan, publish and adapt teaching resource books, you may find this talk by Mark Bloch (who used to be a teacher himself) from Pearson interesting.  The 30(ish) minute talk discusses how Pearson's ActiveTeach evolved from photocopyable, spiral-bound books, to CD-Roms and onwards to interactive whiteboards etc.

Wireless based printing - a trial

We are trialing a wireless based printing service called EveryonePrint that will allow students and staff to send print jobs direct from their PC, Mac, laptop, or mobile device via a web interface or email attachment to the PCounter printing system.

The url is http://webprint.beds.ac.uk and users will need to login with their usual network username and password.

There is a simple browse function and supported files are Office files, PDF and text files. At present JPG, GIF etc are NOT currently supported so it will be necessary to place them in eg a Word document first.

Submission via email allows any file attachments to be submitted automatically to webprint@beds.ac.uk after an initial email registration process. Multiple email addresses can be used.

Once the job is submitted the user is presented with a choice of either mono or colour print queue and the option to print multiple copies or duplex. Options such as multiple pages as with Powerpoint will need to be printed in the conventional way from the software on a normal student / staff PC.

The print job, if successful will be processed and placed into the normal PCounter queue, ready for collection in the normal way.

The trial is operating until the end of March and we would really like to hear what you think of the service, so please send any comments to library.technical@beds.ac.uk

Teacher Reference Center

The Library has recently acquired access to the database 'Teacher Reference Center' from Ebsco.

Teacher Reference Center provides indexing and abstracts for 280 periodicals. In addition, 96% of journals indexed in the database are peer-reviewed. Topics include: Assessment, Best Practices, Continuing Education, Current Pedagogical Research, Curriculum Development, Elementary Education, Higher Education, Instructional Media, Language Arts, Literacy Standards, School Administration, Science & Mathematics, and Teacher Education.

It's available here or via our subject guides.

Remember that you can cross search multiple databases on the Ebsco platform by selecting the 'choose databases' option.

Any problems, please contact your Academic Liaison Librarian.

IOE Digital Education Research Archive is launched

The Institute of Education (IOE) has recently launched the Digital Education Research Archive (DERA)

DERA is a digital archive of documents published electronically by government and related bodies in the area of education. The IOE Library staff have developed this database to ensure that web content is preserved and remains freely available. It is a fully searchable digital archive and already there are approximately 1000 full text documents available. This includes BECTA‘s digital publication archive which is now permanently preserved and available for all.

Please take a look at this excellent resource online here

UK - RED (Reading Experience Database)

The Open University (funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council) recently launched the open access database UK RED (Reading Experience Database) which captures the reading habits from 1450-1945.

UK Red is a great resource for exploring the history of reading in Britain and is fully searchable by keyword with browse lists of readers and authors. There are online tutorials to help you explore the database in depth and a section for adding contributions.

Crowdsourcing and archives

I listened to a fascinating talk last week by an academic called Stuart Lee who's taken a crowdsourcing approach to building an archive of Great War (incl poetry) materials.  The audio file is available from Oxford Brookes University's website:  http://ah.brookes.ac.uk/publishing/podcast/crowd-sourcing-stuart_lee/.  But you can also download it from iTunes.  

The project originated from a much smaller JISC-funded initiative but the Archive now contains over 6,500 items contributed by the general public, 150 audio and movie clips and other materials like timelines.  So it can fit with the curricula for English and History lessons at all levels.  It is all accessible from their fantastic website: http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/.  They have extensive "permitted use" rights for teachers and students.

Vera Brittain in V. A. D. uniform

The First World War Poetry Digital Archive has a section on Vera Brittain (mother of Shirley Williams).  She was great friends with Winifred Holtby (author of South Riding which is currently being serialized on the BBC) and her best-loved books, Testament of Friendship, records their campaigning (for peace and equal rights for women).  A truly inspirational woman.

Tell us what else you think we should buy

As you will see from the previous post, we have recently received a lot of extra money to spend on the collection.  Whilst our priority is to buy from unit reading lists, we are always pleased to receive recommendations from you for books you think we should purchase to broaden the collection.  All you need to do is complete this form and we will do the rest.

New books

The Library was recently given an extra 100k to spend on books and ebooks. The Librarians supporting the Faculty of Education, Sport and Tourism have been busy buying stock recommended on reading lists and suggested by staff and students. Click here to access the list of material ordered.

If you have any recommendations please let us know here.

Web Literacy amongst Secondary pupils

Teachers.TV have produced an excellent 14 minute programme about the critical importance for teachers to provide guidance to their pupils when using the Internet for research.

The film focuses on a group of Year 9 pupils in Leeds who are researching three topics: Martin Luther King; the holocaust; and, Victorian robots.  The exercise reveals that they struggle to spot problems with validity, reliability or authority.  (And don't get me started on plagiarism!)

It brings up lots of issues which clearly impact subjects beyond ICT lessons.