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Back in February I did a 10-minute presentation in a Grade 11 assembly about a new Extended Essay wiki for UWCSEA students. A main reason was to promote National Library membership and its advantages, especially their online databases, so we also handed out the NLB’s “Don’t Panic” booklets. As they’re just at the start of the project, I think the page that interested them the most was the list of previous Extended Essays titles by UWCSEA students, extracted from the school library catalog, as students are allowed to look at past essays stored in the library, though not to check them out. I opened my slide presentation with a photo of a spiral staircase and said they might be wondering why the primary school teacher-librarian was going to talk to them about research. I said learning is a spiral and that what they’re going to do for the Extended Essay is very similar to what the PYP students do in their units of inquiry — on a higher level. The next slide was of the research wheel I use with the youngest kids — a simplified Kath Murdoch one — Tuning In, Finding Out, Sorting Out, and Going Further. They laughed.

So then I mentioned the sites they probably used all the time, e.g., Google and Wikipedia, and said the wiki had links beyond those — before going into my spiel on the NLB and other tools that might help them out.

Time will tell…

Last spring I publicized the National Library (NLB) as a general resource and, in particular, the wide selection of online subscription databases available through the NLB for anyone living in Singapore — whether they had paid to join the National Library or not. We subsequently signed up a lot of our Grade 11 students — in anticipation of them doing Extended Essay research this year in Grade 12.

Unfortunately... over the summer the NLB changed their membership policy. Now foreigners have no option but to pay for Premium Membership (which costs S$ 52.50 to sign up for — and then S$42.50 per subsequent year) to get any book borrowing or digital library privileges.

The good news is that everyone who signed up for FREE digital library membership before the summer is still signed up.

The other good news is that the NLB has improved their search interface. There is a nifty beta release of a one-stop-shopping-search interface. From the eResources tab on the top of their screen, select eSearch & Browse beta (or just click on the words here). Then select eDatabases.You now have the option of entering one phrase and having ALL databases (or all databases in one field) searched.

Give it a try. Go to eSearch & Browse beta — and use this login: max1989 — with the password the very same.

(No, I do not feel guilty telling you to do this — the NLB digital library manager came to the last Singapore international school librarian networking meeting and we complained about the change in policy over the summer — and he professed surprise that it was ever possible to become a Digital Library Member without having paid for any foreign membership. So I sent him this login name/password as proof. Max is my son who is one of those who has never paid for library membership and signed up for the digital library resources last spring. He’s no longer living in Singapore — yet his account is still valid even, after I told the NLB about it, so I see no reason why you shouldn’t use it to check out the NLB Digital Library holdings…)

For example, try entering a search string, e.g., “united world college” (in quotes) — and tick ALL databases to be searched AND select Keyword searches to be used. You can then watch as it collects results in various databases. Wait for the complete list of results to be displayed — then note how it clusters results by sub-topics on the left. (Sorry for the slightly truncated image below… but you get the idea…)

(Did you know Montezuma Castle, the main building of the UWC in New Mexico, hosts a ghost — an opera diva who was a guest at the then-hotel in the 1880s?)

NB: If you try accessing the Digital Resources, but keep getting bumped back to the NLB home page, it probably means they’re doing maintenance. This sometimes happens. Try again later…. And don’t hesitate to come ask me for help if you’re having trouble getting this all to work.

The activities of the United Nations are necessarily of interest to us at UWC — so I thought you might like to know two ways to keep up-to-date with their news.

1) Subscribe to the daily e-mail update from UN Wire

2) Read their blog — UN Dispatch: Posts on the UN – which you can subscribe to — either sign-up to receive updates via e-mail or use their RSS feed to receive updates via an RSS reader (e.g., GoogleReader or Bloglines).

This is one of the news items that landed in my in-box last week, thanks to UN Wire:

UNAIDS to adjust worldwide HIV/AIDS numbers

The United Nations’ AIDS agency released a report Tuesday stating it has systematically overestimated the number of HIV/AIDS cases worldwide since the 1990s. Methodology used to conduct surveys and compile data caused the discrepancy, which will see UNAIDS drop its estimate of the number of cases worldwide from 39.5 million to 33.2 million. Read UNAIDS’ press release and view the report. The New York Times (11/20)

There’s a TED talk (see my previous posting on some of my favorites) which deals with this very issue — which might be of interest to anyone teaching economics or working with AIDS as a global concern. It’s a wonderful example of how research (information plus critical thinking) can help us decide — as a society, as activists, as policy makers — how best to address problems such as AIDS.

TED Talk: Emily Oster — What do we really know about the spread of AIDS?

Here’s her biographical blurb off the TED website (it’s pretty impressive for someone 26 years old):

Her Harvard doctoral thesis took on famed economist Amartya Sen and his claim that 100 million women were statistically missing from the developing world. He blamed misogynist medical care and outright sex-selective abortion for the gap, but Oster pointed to data indicating that in countries where Hepetitis B infections were higher, more boys were born. Through her unorthodox analysis of medical data, she accounted for 50% of the missing girls.

She’s also investigated the role of bad weather in the rise in witchcraft trials in Medieval Europe and what drives people to play the Powerball lottery. Her latest target: busting assumptions on HIV in Africa.

I’m sure some of our students will end up as TED speakers some day.

Did you know the latest Man Booker Prize winner is a UWC graduate? (Pearson College)  And one of Anne Enright’s former Pearson classmates wrote an article in The Telegraph (Calcutta, India) about how one English teacher from those long ago days might be responsible in part for Enright’s success…

Ever do any research? Have any students who ever do any research? Then you should be interested in knowing what’s available free via the National Library of Singapore — for anyone with a FIN [foreign identification number, i.e., an expat] or NRIC [national registration identification card, i.e., a citizen] number (NB: you don’t have to sign up for a library card to get access).

I always promote the National Library Board (NLB) (http://www.nlb.gov.sg) to parents and students as it’s an amazing resource (especially if you’ve been in countries with no English-language libraries or bookstores for several years). It gives you access to millions of books with high-tech convenience. You can search their catalog online (http://vistaweb.nlb.gov.sg/), have books delivered to your local branch for pick-up, etc. The price for foreigners is just S$ 21 a year (Regular Membership, borrowing up to four books) or $42 a year (Premium Membership, up to eight books at a time).

There’s also an extensive Digital Library available online, and until recently, I assumed I only had access to that because I had paid for Premium Membership. I was wrong — and now I feel the need to spread the news.

Anyone with a FIN or NRIC number can register online for the Digital Library and get instant access to 145 databases – many of them full-text ones — and the list includes many of the major databases you would find in a university library.

For example:
<<<<<<<
EBSCOHost Academic Search Premiere:
Provides full-text for over 4,500 publications, including full-text for more than 3,600 peer-reviewed journals in subject areas such as biology, chemistry, engineering, physics, religion, arts and sociology. Titles include American Journal of Political Science, American Libraries, British Journal of Sociology, Contemporary Literature, International Journal of Psychology, and Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.

EBSCOHost MAS Ultra – Public Library Edition:
Provides full-text from more than 350 periodicals covering general reference topics, including health, science, and other areas. Includes indexing and abstracts for nearly 500 periodicals and full-text for hundreds of important pamphlets. Titles include Advertising Age, American Economist, American Family Physician, American Fitness, Business Week, Computerworld, Discover, Economist, Forbes, Foreign Affairs, Good Housekeeping, and Guitar Player.

EBSCOHost NoveList: [ENGLISH TEACHERS -- take note!]
Provides subject heading access, reviews, annotations, and more for over 135,000 fiction titles. Includes other content of interest to fiction readers, such as Author Read-alikes, Book Discussion Guides, BookTalks, and Feature Articles.

Project MUSE:
Project MUSE is a unique collaboration between libraries and publishers providing 100% full-text, affordable and user-friendly online access to over 300 high quality humanities, arts, and social sciences journals from 60 scholarly publishers.

ProQuest Science Journals:
Search full text and images from over 400 leading periodicals in science and technology. Subject coverage includes computers, engineering, physics, telecommunications, and transportation.

ProQuest Social Science Journals:
Search over 480 full text periodicals covering the social sciences. Titles include Economic Development and Cultural Change, Gender Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, International Social Work, Journal of Aging & Social Policy, Journal of Asian and African Studies.
>>>>>>

I encourage you to check out the full list of databases available. Just go to: http://tinyurl.com/2amv4n

To register for this Digital Library service, go to: http://tinyurl.com/272kp4
[NB: For the input field "Library Membership", simply select 'None' if you don't have a National Library card.]

This should be an invaluable resource for Extended Essay students, in particular. All they need to do is sign up individually. (According to the National Library, we can’t give our students access via our own institutional membership.)

Note: one way to “sell” these kinds of databases to students is to compare them to cable TV, i.e., the Internet is like the free television channels, while subscription databases are like the cable channels — you get better, more specific information/programs by paying. And the beauty of the National Library’s service is that it’s the government who is paying.

Let me know if you have any questions or problems accessing any of the links above — or want suggestions of databases that would be relevant to your subject area and/or students.