Skills in Accessing, Finding & Reviewing Information - Safari

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1 . Understanding information 1. Introduction 2. What is information? 3. The information age 4. Everyday uses 5. Types of information 6. Information universe 7. Mapping sources 8. Identifying needs 9. Summary

2 . Unpacking information 1. Introduction 2. Information journeys 3. Supply chain 4. Research supply chain 5. Categorising information 6. Shape of the literature 7. Finding information 8. Summary

3 . Planning a search 1. Introduction 2. Describing information 3. Databases 4. Library catalogues 5. World Wide Web 6. Which to use? 7. Planning a search 8. Choosing resources 9. Summary

4 . Searching for information 1. Introduction 2. Basic principles 3. Databases 4. Library catalogues 5. World Wide Web 6. Tracking progress 7. Your subject 8. Summary

5 . Evaluating information 1. Introduction 2. Information quality 3. Presentation 4. Relevance 5. Objectivity 6. Method 7. Provenance 8. Timeliness 9. Summary

6 . Organising information 1. Introduction 2. Why organise? 3. Ways to organise 4. Social bookmarks 5. Citing references 6. Bibliographies 7. Summary

7 . Where do I go from here 1. Introduction 2. Sharing information 3. Electronic communication 4. Keeping up-to-date 5. Summary

Topic 4 Keeping up to date

Sometimes referred to as ‘current awareness’, the process of keeping up-to-date in your chosen subject area is not just important for your studies. Afterwards, updating your knowledge on an on-going basis will be a vital part of your professional development.

There are many ways to keep up-to-date, a lot of them electronic (for example, the listservs and newsletters we identified as useful in the networking exercise). On the next few pages you will find some more information about these and some suggestions for other ways to keep abreast of the latest developments in your field.

Activity Adding resources

As you read through the next few pages you may wish to add to the lists of tools and resources you made for Section 7 Topic 3 Page 2. Hopefully you will also have further ideas about how you can use them for your own studies too.

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