CAMIO

Searching for “Paul Revere” at CAMIO, I found he created
“The Bloody Massacre” print,“The Boston Massacre” print
and several silver items.
After entering “Sioux,” I found 63 items and was
surprised there were not more items listed for such a
broad search.  On the left, I see one can search by
creator, date,and subject which make sense, but it is
interesting that a search can be done using “format.”

Since we have an original Harvey Dunn painting in our
library, I searched for his work,but was unable to find
anything.
I next typed in “Pablo Picasso” which yielded 994 works.
While perusing the works, I found there are other artists
included in the search such as Claude Monet and Georges
Braques.  I can see where our art classes would be
interested in using this as well as our public patrons.

I put a few of Picasso’s paintings in favorites and after
viewing favorites, I see I could use these on a website. 
Coincidentally, we are in the process of updating our
online library catalog to include various images.
Perhaps, CAMIO could be used for this.

ArchiveGrid

After search “Sitting Bull autograph card” on ArchiveGrid, I found a brief summary about Sitting Bull. He was a Sioux leader and shaman who fought at Little Bighorn. He led his people to Canada to avoid the white settlers and their army. After surrendering, he traveled in Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show. He was later killed while resisting arrest after being charged for practicing his Native American traditions which had been deemed illegal.

The site does not discuss the autograph card other than to give its location in the collection at Cornell University. I am curious as to where the autograph was found, what was Sitting Bull signing, and how it was authenticated.

I searched for “Abraham Lincoln letter” and found 13 possible matches. The first entry entitled “Oregon Miscellany” provides a facsimile of an Abraham Lincoln letter dated Nov. 19, 1858, but it does not discuss the content of the letter itself. This item is found at the University of California, Berkeley.

The Minnesota Historical Society houses the second entry, “William R. Marshall papers, 1853-1894,” which provides a bit more background about the letter: “a facsimile of the Abraham Lincoln letter to Henry H. Sibley listing the names of the Dakota Indians to be executed following the Dakota Conflict.” But this is the only historical information about the letter included here.

ArchiveGrid seems like a good place to start searching for historical items. As for historical information, a researcher has an idea of where to look for more details, but the database itself doesn’t give a great deal of details itself.

WorldCat

Of the databases we have been perusing, I am most familiar with WorldCat. We use it for interlibrary loans as well as for help when we are cataloging books.

I searched for "Catalog It." 127 libraries have this title. The top library is South Dakota State Library. The call number is LC:Z693 or Dewey: 025.3; 027.8. The book has two authors the first author listed has written 3 other books. The second author has written 5 other texts. All are related to the roles of library media specialists. Under subjects, I chose "Cataloging" and 545 items were found. The search includes books, internet sites, updated resources, serials, and archives.

In OAIster, I looked up an article called "Factors affecting road mortality of whitetailed deer in eastern South Dakota." The access tab brought me to a website for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. I was then able to download the entire article. Another valuable resource!

NetLibrary

Whew! I have fallen behind!
On to NetLibrary....I searched for "Catalog It," a book I need for a class this fall. It wasn't available here, but several related texts were, over 4,000 items were included in the search. The related topics are helpful to narrow the search or broaden it if needed. Searching again, this time for "information literacy," I discovered two interesting texts I'll have to come back to again...
NetLibrary can be a valuable resource for libraries especially with regard to technology. The books on technology that are available in our library become outdated so fast it is hard to keep relevant material on the shelves.

The search for "Constitution Day" pulled various items including material involving the constitution days of other countries. The book Representing Popular Sovereignty: The Constitution in American Political Culture discusses our chosen subject, explaining that the name was changed to "Citizenship Day." Searching now for "Citizenship Day," I am not finding many texts that discuss it in much detail. Maybe I am doing something wrong but I can only find books that mention it and that day that it falls on...

Next, under advanced search, I plugged in "Oklahoma" for a publisher search and found 77 related titles....very helpful, great resource...

Gale Virtual Reference Library

Using Gale Virtual Reference Library, I searched under "Medicine" and clicked on The Gale Encyclopedia of Children's Health : Infancy through Adolescence. In volume 2, I found an entry for Hypothyroidism which gives a through explanation of the disease as well as resource books, organizations, and websites. In addition, the article is linked to other articles by various index terms which provides even more options for finding information.

Next, I did a basic search for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The search yielded 54 books that were in some way relevant to the search. The books were then listed based on relevancy to my search. Included to the right of each title was a notation showing what was included in each book, such as "Topic overview," "Critical essay," "Work overview," "Biography," and "Plot summary." A photograph icon is also included for those that have pictures. The first and most relevant title, "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" found in the source Literary Themes for Students: Race and Prejudice provides an introduction which includes a small biography of Mark Twain, plot summary broken up in 3 chapter sections, themes, historical overview, critical overview, criticism, and sources. To the left of the article, additional related subjects are listed as well. The read to me feature is a nice addition.

Proquest

Using the basic search option on Proquest to learn more about Congenital Hypothyroidism, I found 163 documents. 94 items were from scholarly journals, 3 in magazines, 72 trade publications, and 1 newspaper article. After clicking "show only full text," 105 documents remained. Unlike the other databases I have ventured through so far, Proquest does not differentiate reading level of the sources listed. In fact, some of the articles are quite difficult, especially those in the trade publications, which in this case are scientific journals such as Genomics and Genetics Weekly. Proquest provides additional suggested topics to help the search for information. In addition, this database has an alert system that will send new information to the users email address if the user wishes to sign up. Documents can be marked and saved to My Research where the user can compile the information for a bibliography, email documents, export citations, or create a webpage.

Looking under the Publications tab, I search for librarian and found 4 publications which included a Blog, The Distant Librarian, which I found interesting. I then searched for library science and discovered only one publication, Journal of Education for Library and Information Science. Under library media specialist, nothing appeared. A search for "library media" uncovered Library Media Connection. I suppose this makes sense as there are not many publications concerning library science. Is it wrong to think there should be more?

SIRS Issues Researcher

After visiting SIRS Issues Researcher, all I could think was "I wish I could have had this to use when I was in school!" The available information and tools are amazing. What a great asset for students working on research papers....
Under leading issues, I searched human trafficking. The Topic Overview gives a good introduction to the subject while the Timeline gives background information on the happenings around the world past and present. The search provided 170 sources including articles from magazines and newspapers, editorials, reference materials, websites, and other media.

I could spend hours using this database. It could be used in every single classroom and by every single patron. The Curriculum Pathfinders is awesome! I searched under Language Arts, my first love, Reading and found the PBS website, Reading and Language. The Bookfinder at this website would be very useful for patrons searching for the right books for their children. And this is just one of the several interesting things I found here!

The toolbox would be useful for students writing research papers, while the iThink tutor would be a good starting spot for teachers when teaching how to write a research paper.

As a new librarian, I can't wait to use the educators' resources and the promotional toolkits.