2. Library Research

Your college, university, or public library has a wealth of secondary sourcesfor most research topics. You may use the online orcard catalogueto find books on your research topic. The periodical indexwill show you periodicals (magazines, journals, and newspapers) that have current information relating to your topic. You may ask your librarian to show you both print and online periodical indexes. You may consult statistical sourcessuch as the Statistics Canada website if your research topic requires statistics or facts. You may use encyclopedias andreference booksto find information on almost every subject. Regardless of which sources you choose, you must evaluateeach to be sure it is reliable, current, objective, and written by a knowledgeable expert.

Once you have found reliable sources, take clear and careful notes on your topic, summarize your sources, carefully copy direct quotations, and indirectly quote important information. You must include the following information in your notes in order to correctly cite your sources in the final paper. Note the citations below follow MLA(Modern Language Association) format.

Book: Author name(s), title and subtitle, year of publication, publisher and location of publisher, exact pages of material quoted or summarized

Example (Summary): According to S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Earth goes through cycles of warming and cooling. From about 750 to 450 BCE (before Rome was founded), Egyptian records show a cooling trend that caused great changes in water levels on the Nile. Scientific research shows that the Earth then warmed up between 200 BCE and 600 CE in what is known as "The Roman Warming" (41-43).

Singer, S. Fred, and Dennis T. Avery. Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years. Lanham, MD: Rowman, 2008. Print.

Periodical: Author name(s), title of article, title of periodical, date of publication, volume and number (if applicable), page number(s)

Example (Direct Quotation): "In a new TIME/ABC News/Stanford University poll, 85% of respondents agree that global warming probably is happening. Moreover, most respondents say they want some action taken. Of those polled, 87% believe the government should either encourage or require lowering of power-plant emissions, and 85% think something should be done to get cars to use less gasoline" (31).

Kluger, Jeffrey. "Global Warming Heats Up." Time. 3 Apr. 2006: 30-37. Print.

Directions: In the following section, you will see two examples of note cards from a student's research. Review the note cards, and answer the questions that follow.

Note card A: According to The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was founded in 1949 by 11 original members, including Belgium, Iceland, Italy, Britain, and the United States. Other countries, including Germany, Turkey, Greece, and Poland, joined NATO later. The point of the organization is for the members to peacefully settle conflict and to protect one another against enemies. (Boston & New York. Houghton Mifflin Company. 2002.)

Note card A is an example of:

A summary from a periodical

A direct quotation from a periodical

A summary from a book

What information is missingfrom note card A?Check all that apply.

Location of publisher

Title and subtitle

Page number(s)

No missing information

Year of publication

Author

Name of publisher

Note card B: "April 2009 marks the sixtieth anniversary of the most enduring and successful diplomatic and military alliance in the history of democracy" (108). (Zoltan Barany, "NATO at Sixty." Journal of Democracy, Vol. 20, No. 2, April 2009, pages 108-122.)

Note card B is an example of:

A summary from a periodical

A direct quotation from a periodical

A direct quotation from a book

What information is missingfrom note card B?Check all that apply.

Author

Title of article

Page number(s)

Year and month of publication

No missing information

Title of publication

Volume and number of publication