Online Programs - Cincinnati: 4. Access - Finding Books, Videos, and Articles

Part 1. ESSENTIAL SKILL - USING THE LC CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM  (20 min. or less)

      Why?  To locate needed books or "browse shelves" inside the library; to browse by LC number in the online Catalog

1.   To locate books and videos in Watson Library (and most other academic libraries), you will use the Library of Congress Classification System,  the "LC" system.  It is alphabet based.  School and public libraries most often use the Dewey Decimal System, which is number based.

A. What is the LC Classification System?  Click here: LC Classification   - find your current major area

B. Click to learn the basics of the LC shelving system:  

http://www.usg.edu/galileo/skills/unit03/libraries03_04.phtml

 [Lincoln Memorial University, Carnegie Vincent Library]

2.  Next, self-check on LC system skills - try this self-quiz: 

Try this different self-quiz of your knowledge of the LC system.  http://www.library.kent.edu/page/13762    [Drag and Drop quiz from Kent State University Libraries, immediate feedback].

Anytime you have questions about LC , please stop by to see a Watson Librarian or email us at library@wilmington.edu

Part 2.  ESSENTIAL SKILL - NAVIGATING THE LIBRARY CATALOG 

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OK, SO HOW DO I REQUEST AN ITEM FROM ANOTHER LIBRARY?

To request books in WC Discover, you must be signed in - we use single sign in, so you will authenticate through your Microsoft Office 365 login information. The sign-in option is in the upper right corner of the screen, and you will also be prompted with a banner to sign in so you get complete results. 

Once you are signed in, you will see the option to "request a copy" of any book that is available. All you need to do is click the request button. 

When a book you've requested arrives, you will get an email sent to your WC email account, letting you know the book is available at the circulation desk in the library for you to pick up. 

Watson Library offers online help for accessing many different eBook platforms.  Click here for assistance.

To search Watson Library's collection of over 200 different databases, go to the Databases & Collections tab on the library website, and select the link for Databases A-Z. 

(If you are off campus, you will be sent through single sign-on to use the library databases.)

Hint: a good database to start with is Academic Search Complete. Academic Search Complete has articles from a wide range of both popular and scholarly journals, and covers a wide variety of topics 

For more information about using EBSCO databases, see the tutorial HERE. 

For "expert" searching, work with the Subject terms that come up in your search results.   Here's an example of the difference between the number of articles retrieved in Keyword and Subject searching in Academic Search Complete, beginning with SPORTS as a keyword. More is not better.  Notice that as your search terms become more specific, your results list gets smaller, more focused, and more workable.