Cite in style with the EasyBib scanner

Posted on November 28, 2012 by Cam Hocking

EasyBib is one of many freely available bibliography generators. While it has most of the standard options seen in other services, it does have some innovative features. You can link up your bibliography with a Google Drive document and automatically cite websites using an extension in Chrome. But perhaps the most interesting feature is the ability to add books using a barcode scanner in the EasyBib mobile app.

The EasyBib app is free and available for Android and IOS (Apple) devices. The app doesn’t require an EasyBib account. In fact one of the main limitations of the app is that it doesn’t integrate with your account at all. But the barcode scanning feature works well and bibliographies can then be sent by email.

To use the scanner, simply open the app, click Scan and then point your camera at a book’s barcode.

If the barcode is recognised the details of the book will be added to your citations list. You can select from MLA, APA or Chicago citation styles, organise your citation list with the Manage button, and then email your citations when you are finished. Unfortunately at this stage there is no option to manually edit or correct the details of an item.

Emailed citations also include an option to add the item to your EasyBib account (once you are logged in on your computer).

Despite the limitations of EasyBib free accounts (such as limited citations styles) the option to scan barcodes in the app is definitely useful. It is certainly a feature that is likely to appeal to students, but might be even more popular with those of us who can remember those dark days of having to meticulously type out all of those bibliographies and citations.

Searching Google with your voice

Posted on November 8, 2012 by slvadmin

Today’s guest post comes from Bev Novak. Bev takes a look at the new Google search app for IOS devices and tests out the voice search feature.

Released a couple of days ago, I just discovered the latest Google search app and I must say it’s really cool!

Designed for both the iPhone and iPad, this latest update allows you to search just by asking a question! Simply select the microphone icon on the new Google search page to instantly find answers to absolutely anything.

I’ve just had fun asking some very basic questions and had graphic returns within seconds:

What year was Napoleon born?

What is 10 Euro in Australian dollars?

What’s the weather tomorrow?

And if you want to be really impressed, just sit back and relax after giving the command ‘Play the trailer for the new James Bond movie’.

By using Knowledge Graph in its search technology the app is able to answer questions about people and places, says Google. Referred to in some reviews as Google’s attempt to take on Siri at her own game, the competition is certainly heating up with this new release and the winners are most definitely the users!

My one disappointment though is that none of the responses to my questions have elicited audio responses as they do in this video released by Google. I must admit though that even without audio responses I’ve been very impressed with both the speed and accuracy of responses. My mind is abuzz with the many different ways this can be used in our classrooms.

Have a listen and be inspired!

Thanks to Bev for taking a look at this interesting new Google search feature. This post originally appeared on the NovaNews blog, where Bev has some wonderful thoughts about teaching and learning. You can also follow Bev on Twitter.

Save quotes with Citelighter

Posted on October 17, 2012 by Yen Wong

Citelighter is a free online bibliographic management tool. It claims to be a simple tool that allows you click on a ‘Capture’ button every time you want to add a resource to your collection. This will then allow you to automatically create a bibliography.

After downloading the widget to Firefox, I ran into trouble right from the start – the Citelighter toolbar didn’t seem to let me login and the ‘Capture’ button didn’t seem to work. I tried logging off and logging back on but that didn’t help. But after a few attempts I managed to get it going. Using the toolbar in Google Chrome seemed to work better. Despite the way Citelighter lets you save quotes with one- click, I still have a few reservations about the extent of its usefulness:

– The introductory video mentioned that it “grabs most of the bibliographic information”. Despite this, Citelighter will not grab details of books. In this way it is less powerful than tools like Zotero or BibMe. Citelighter is not as efficient if we have to source and enter the missing information.

– Citelighter seems to rely on the user to highlight the text and also fill in several bibliographic details. This can be problematic for people who prefer to read from the printed text. This indicates that Citelighter is only capable of recognising websites but not printed resources such as books and journals. And yes, sure enough, you will need to manually add all the bibliographic details yourself – how inconvenient!

Citelighter lets you highlight and capture quotes

Overall I would say that Citelighter and the toolbar is a useful tool for keeping track of online quotes, but it is not as powerful as a tool like Zotero. But if all you need is a service that lets you save quotes and produce bibliographies for online materials, then Citelighter could be useful. Have a look at our guide to using Citelighter to see how to get started.

Create Customised Resource Collections with Gooru

Posted on October 16, 2012 by Catherine Hainstock

Gooru is a search engine you won’t want to miss if you are a Science, Math or Social Sciences teacher. It is free to use and allows teachers to create customised ‘play-lists’ of resources for their students. Gooru’s library of resources is extensive, vetted by learning professionals and includes videos, games, interactive items, texts and quizzes.
Once registered, creating your own ‘play-list’ or ‘Collection’ is an easy search, drag and drop process. Teachers will also appreciate professional touches such as the ability to include key vocabulary and learning objectives in the collection overview, and being able to add voice narration to direct students or highlight points within the collection.
The collaborative nature of the site allows teachers to use and adapt collections that other professionals have created and shared. Initially, any collections you create will default to a private setting, but once the quality of the content has been checked by the site’s experts (they are stringent about inappropriate content), Gooru encourages users to share; it is part of the growing OER (Open Education Resources) movement.

Students need to register to access collections and resources too, but are not able to create content or edit unless collaborator status is shared with them.

Perhaps the most appealing feature of all is Gooru’s ‘smart quizzes’. Students can test their understanding as they learn via enriched quizzes that can offer hints and explanations during the process. Once a quiz is taken, students receive feedback, including suggestions for further resources to enhance their understanding if needed.

Gooru is currently in beta so feedback and suggestions are welcome as they further improve the site. The website promises:

Our machine learning experts are working hard to develop and improve our algorithms and performance and deliver a truly personalized and adaptive learning experience.

Sounds like things will even get better.

Google launches Search Education site

Posted on May 30, 2012 by Cam Hocking

Google has recently launched a new Search Education site which aims to help teachers and students hone search skills. The site includes a number of lesson plans (aligned to the U.S. Common Core Standards) and could form the basis of an interesting discussion with students about search and search literacy.

The lesson plans often refer back to the A Google a Day site or feature activities based on an introductory video like the one below. This video is worth a look. Not only does it give a nice overview of how Google indexes pages, but it would also be worth examining with students the claims made at the two minute mark that Google “don’t ever accept payment to add a site to our index, update it more often or improve its ranking.” You might have students consider the validity of this claim and show students how to distinguish between paid advertisements and unpaid results. Comparing Google results to other commercial or academic search engines would also be a worthwhile exploration of how search engines work.

While some educators bemoan the increasing reliance on Google by students, any resources that help to demystify search and help students search more effectively are useful additions to the classroom. Like any resource it is important to speak with students about the credibility of the Search Education site. Have a discussion about the reasons it has been created and the intentions of Google. This will not only help students become better searchers but also help them be more critical about evaluating the reliability or bias of websites they visit.

Getting the most out of Evernote

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Cam Hocking

The 2012 Victorian PLN course has been progressing well, with participants next week beginning Unit 9 of the course. This unit looks at research and referencing with a particular focus on one of our favourite tools; Evernote.

Many of our readers tell us that Evernote is the application that has changed the way they work. We’ve posted about it before, but it’s worthwhile touching base again as the developers are constantly adding new functions. The power of Evernote is that it provides a searchable catalogue of your notes which are synchronised across a variety of devices. You can also add voice recordings, handwritten notes and pictures, or clip entire web pages for later.

If you are looking to get started with Evernote feel free to visit the Victorian PLN blog and have a look at the Evernote page, which has some screencasts and tips to get you going.

For those of you who know the basics, a recent article by ReadWriteWeb outlines some of the ways you can make Evernote even more powerful. These tips include how to share notebooks, save web pages or email notes directly to your account. One particularly interesting tip for educators is the ability to disable web syncing on some notebooks so notes are not stored in the cloud. This may be useful if you have sensitive information (such as student data or parent contact details) that you would prefer to only store on your computer. This option is only available when you create a new notebook (see below).

For tips about student use you can read Buffy Hamilton’s great post about using Evernote in the classroom. Remember to share any tips you have in the comments below or on the Bright Ideas Facebook page.

Featured post: instaGrok

Posted on April 26, 2012 by slvadmin

Today our featured post comes from Bev Novak, writer of the fantastic NovaNews blog. Bev’s post is about the new educational search site instaGrok, which looks like a very promising tool that includes elements of Google’s now defunct Wonderwheel.

instaGrok – a winner for those who loved Wonder Wheel!

The value of social networking is profound! I’m sure that without it, it would have taken me a while to discover instaGrok.

instaGrok – an interactive learning tool provides an expansive array of returns for each search. Producing a spiral visual graph on the left pane, numerous links are simultaneously generated on the right hand panel and are neatly categorized under headings: key facts, websites, videos, images, quizzes and concepts. With a tab to moderate the level of difficulty of results returned, this tool really has enourmous potential as a teaching tool. The ‘about’ tab on the homepage, also tell us that instGrok

finds age-appropriate educational content on any topic presented with interactive multimedia interfaces
generates quiz questions based on student’s research activity and skill level
supports creation of research journals and concept maps for learning assessment

Just take a look at this short video which appears on the instaGrok homepage:

For those of us who lamented the disappearance of Wonder Wheel – that great tool which simply vanished from the Google suite of tools about a year ago –instaGrok sure looks to be a winner!

You can find the original post here. Make sure you also have a look at Bev’s Book Blog, which features news and reflections on literature and books. Thank you Bev for sharing your work with us.

Closing the book on the printed encyclopaedia

Posted on March 15, 2012 by Cam Hocking

The New York Times has reported the the Encyclopaedia Britannica will no longer produce a printed edition as content will now only be available digitally. The decision ends a 244 year tradition and signals a significant shift by the encyclopaedia’s Chicago publisher.

While many have predicted that the rise of easily updatable websites like Wikipedia would see the end of the printed encyclopaedia, this might not mean the end of the printed book as others are touting. The encyclopaedia may well have been the form of printed book most threatened by the increasing reliance on digital content. The relatively slow process of editing and publishing means that many entries can be out of date before the volume hits the shelves.

Is this need for constantly updated information- with an emphasis placed on the speed of updating rather than rigour- a worrying trend? Surely it just further emphasises the importance of being able to critically analyse a source for reliability and accuracy. Maybe it will lead to an even savvier generation of readers who constantly question the reliability of information and evaluate their sources.

Perhaps the greater concern for many (apart from any door-to-door encyclopaedia sellers still out there) may be that we may no longer have printed copies that document the prevailing knowledge of our time. Older encyclopaedias like the Nuremberg Chronicle provide an insight into the accepted beliefs of a time period, or at least the accepted beliefs of the writers and editors. Surely this move to digital content raises even more issues surrounding digital archiving and preservation. Maybe people will be visiting libraries and museums in a hundred years to pore over archived copies of Wikipedia.

Should we be concerned about this shift to digital, or is it time to accept that the printed encyclopaedia can’t compete with the wealth of constantly updated content available?

Library guides at the State Library

Posted on March 7, 2012 by Kelly Gardiner

Librarians from the State Library of Victoria have been putting together Library guides on various subject areas to help people with their research tasks.

It’s essentially a cheat sheet that guide you through the research process by wading through the array of resources available to you.

Here’s a sample of what’s been created:
1. Aboriginal people & the law
2. Adoption & forgotten Australians
3. Bushfires
4. Companies in Australia
5. Court cases in Australia
6. Early Australian census records
7. Finding Australian legislation
8. Finding book reviews
9. Finding music scores & popular songs
10. Finding poetry

There are 28 more guides on a range of topics but you can see the entire list here.

It’s commonplace for universities to have library guides, so do check them out for other subject areas, especially for senior students. Or you can create your own easily and quickly, in LibGuides.

Let us know if you’ve already created some LibGuides – we’d love to hear about them.

Pinterest: beyond the buzz

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Kelly Gardiner

You may have heard of Pinterest, the new social media platform that is taking the web by storm. Pinterest is like a virtual pinboard, where you share images you like either gathered from the web (like a shared bookmark) or uploaded from your own collection. Users can create boards on any theme and these are also tagged in categories, so you can browse through History or Technology, for example, and re-pin other people’s favourites to your own pin boards. You can follow other people’s boards and you can also integrate it with your facebook or Twitter accounts.

A Pin it! bookmarklet to add to your browser makes it easy to grab web content.

The joy of Pinterest is its visual nature – you can’t save text-only content, only material with images attached (even if it’s a web page with lots of text and only one image). That makes it perfect for gathering items together like a scrapbook.

Interestingly, most data so far indicates that the vast majority of its users are women. That’s not surprising, as many of the early users did use it as a scrapbook, so that some of the most glorious image collections are in themes like historical fashion and home decor – including drool-worthy bookshelves and libraries (there are also a lot of recipes).

But dig a little deeper – if you can – and you’ll soon recognise Pinterest’s value as an image repository, link sharing community, and easy-to-use site for students or classes to quickly assemble project materials on a huge range of topics.

Under the Education category you’ll find teaching materials and classroom activities gathered together by educators all over the world, and in other categories you and your students can find everything from historic photos of Victorian London or World War 1, to images of shoes worn in 1770 or wildlife or botanical drawings.

These “pins” can be shared on social media or embedded in blogs or websites.

Pinterest is deceptively simple and dangerously addictive. Beware.

School Library Association of Victoria

Category Archives: Research tools