Education Research

• Resources
• Research strategies
• Writing and citing

Resources for Education Research

• Definitions, facts, figures and overviews
• Books and more
• Subject readings
• Journal articles
• Internet sites
• Related resources
  • Curriculum resources (CRC collection)
  • Teaching resources and support (Internet links)

Education Research definitions, facts, figures and overviews

• Dictionaries help you to define your keywords
• Encyclopedias help you to get an overview of your topic and provide more information than a dictionary
• Handbooks and manuals provide figures and facts

Online dictionaries, encyclopedias and handbooks

Print dictionaries, encyclopedias and handbooks

To find additional reference items

1. Search the Library Catalogue
2. Select advanced keyword search
3. Combine a broad keyword AND the word dictionar**
   
   education AND dictionar**
   
   education AND encycloped**
   
   education AND handbook**
   
   
4. To retrieve variations of your keyword use the truncation symbol **
   
   e.g. educat** will retrieve educate, educates, education, educational

Need help? Ask a question.

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Education Research books and more

Search the Library Catalogue to find books, videos, CDs

If you know the exact title

1. Select title search
2. Type in the exact title
3. Check the location, call number and status boxes to find the item in the Library collection

If you don't have an exact title OR only have a topic area

1. Select advanced keyword search
2. Type in keywords from your topic
3. Combine your keywords with AND to find catalogue records that contain all of your keywords
   
   e.g. education AND research
   
   
4. To retrieve variations of your keyword use the truncation symbol **
   
   e.g. educat** will retrieve educate, education, educator, etc

Catalogue search tips:

• Too many hits? Add another keyword e.g. education AND research AND australia
  OR
  Use the limit functions in advanced keyword search e.g. limit by publication date, format, location
• Found a useful title? Click on the subject headings to find similar material
• Studying at a different UOW campus? Use an advanced keyword search and limit by location

Need help? Ask a question.

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Education Research journal articles

Search a database to find journal articles, book chapters, conference papers, research reports and newspaper articles.

Try these first

Complete list of Education databases

Found a useful reference?

Some databases do not provide the fulltext of the article. To locate these articles, you will need to search the catalogue to determine if the Library holds the journal title(s) either in print or electronically on another database.

Database search tips:

• Break your topic into keywords and/or phrases. The search strategy worksheet will help you
• Consider alternative keywords or spelling variations
• To narrow your search combine your keywords with AND to find records that contain all your keywords
  
  e.g. curriculum AND theor**
  
  
• To broaden your search combine your keywords with OR to find records that contain either of your keywords
  
  e.g. curriculum OR course
  
  
• Use truncation to retrieve variations of your keyword. Symbols vary between databases
  
  e.g. learn* retrieves learns, learners, learning.
  
  
• Found a useful reference? Use the subject headings to find similar material

• Use library database tips or the database help screens for tips on how to search

More information: Finding Journal Articles Tutorial

Need help? Ask a question.

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Education Research Internet sites

It is important to critically evaluate all information found on the Web.

Try the following sites as a starting point.

• Research and teaching
• Statistics
• Search engines and directories
• UOW Sites

Research and teaching

Australia

• Action Research Resources
  Provides links to conference abstracts, mailing lists and other resources relating to Action Research.
• Association for Qualitative Research

• Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER)
  Access current educational research findings. Users can access a wide range of databases and information about services from the Cunningham Library

• Australian Association for Research in Education (AARE)
  This site contains conference papers, an academic journal, news, information, results, findings, effects, scholarship, literature, data and analyses of education.
• Australian Research Council (ARC)
  ARC supports research and research training in all fields of science, social sciences and the humanities.
• EdNA (Educational Network of Australia)
  Both a directory of educational resources and a network for collaboration and cooperation between teachers administrators and researchers. Provides a wealth of resources.
• Education Internet Guide - University of Sydney Library
  Provides a wealth of web resources on a variety of education related topics

International

• American Educational Research Association
  AERA is an international professional organization whose primary goal is the advancment of educational research and its practical application
• Education-line
  This is a searchable index of conference papers from the British Educational Research Association)
• The Educator's Reference Desk
  This site has replaced the original ERIC website. It provides access to education related literature including free access to the ERIC database.
• International Institute for Qualitative Methodology
• National Center for Education Statistics (U.S.)
• What Works Clearing House
  Established by the U.S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences (IES) this site provides educators, , researchers, and the public with a central source of scientific evidence of what works in education.

Statistics

• Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Education Services
  The ABS site showcases ABS products, news and relevant statistical material. It also contains information which can be used in the classroom and to support student research.
• Social Sciences Data on the Internet
  In this database you can search a large number of Internet sites containing Social Science statistical data, data catalogues, data libraries, social science gateways, addresses and more.
• Australian Stastistical Internet Sites
  This site has been compiled by the National Library of Australia and categorises statistical links into headings such as Statistics by Subject.
• How to find statistics

Search engines and directories

Search engines create databases using computer programs called 'spiders', 'robots' or 'crawlers' that trawl the web and other Internet sites and return results to the database.

Try these first:

Remember to evaluate all information.

• EduSearch.com.au
• Google Scholar
• Infomine: Scholarly Internet Resource Collection
• Other search engines and directories

Directories organise Internet resources by subject. The information provided in directories is created, arranged and maintained by people rather than machines.

• Academic Info: Education
• Awesome Library
• Education World
• Education Planet
• Brint.com Research and Teaching
• Education Virtual Library

UOW sites

• Faculty of Education
• Faculty of Education - connecting undergraduate students

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Last reviewed: 29 October, 2007