[LM_NET] Hit: Teaching 8th grade media skills

[Bev Nelson <bev.nelson@SPRINGGROVE.K12.MN.US>]

I had two responses, though many requests, for information on teaching 8th
grade databases.  Here is what I received:

I applaud you for exposing your 8th graders to research databases.  Do
not give up.  Having taught in high school, 2 year tech school, 4 year
college, I can tell you that even at the college level most students
just don't get it. Keep plugging along, the more they hear it the
better.  I try to point what databases have in common with internet
searching.  Being a better database searcher will make them a better
searcher in the google environment.  Alas, I have no words of wisdom
just a few observations.

One thing I have wanted to do with my freshmen is to have them read a
short article, come up with some keywords that best describe the
article, and then have try to find the article using their keywords in a
research database (EBSCO's MasterFile).  They might start to see how
databases are put together.  I have also printed off the first citations
of a simple search and had students examine them and see if the article
would really help answer the research question I posed.  Many soon
discover that a keyword found in the subject heading of the article is
better than one found in the author field.

In conjunction with our 8th grade language arts
teacher, this is how I teach the databases:

I go over the basic terms and demo using Sirs
Discoverer.
(For most this a general review as I start teaching
databases in grade 3). Each student is then assigned a
partner and a database. They have one week to work
together and then present their database to the whole
class. What were the really neat features? What
couldn't they figure out? For what subject(s) would
this database be most useful? Not useful at all for
.................

In addition, if the database has an e-mail feature,
they have to e-mail me an article.

For the 7th grade, I work with the teacher assignment
by assignment and teach the appropriate database.
-- 
"What a school thinks about its library, is a measure of what it thinks
about education." Harold Howe, former U.S. Commissioner of Education

Beverly Nelson
Media Generalist
Spring Grove Public School
113 2nd Ave NW 
Spring Grove, Minnesota  55974
507-498-3223
bev.nelson@springgrove.k12.mn.us

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