Database competency 6 - Library Literature and Information Science

For this competency, I need to perform 4 out of 5 search strategies for this database. Below is a record of my explorations.

Research Question: What is the correlation (if any) between technology rich library/media centers and student achievement?

Search Strategy - Building Block

1. I logged into the database Library Literature and Information Science.
2. I entered the following search: (correlation or relationship) and (technology or computer*) and (student achievement or learning). I received 41 records.
3. I think I need to expand my search. New search: (technology or computer*) and (student achievement or learning or cognition). This gave me 1955 records. Now, I will narrow these results to only include child learners and not adults.
4. New search: (technology or computer*) and (student achievement or learning or cognition) and child*. This search retrieved 136 records. In looking through these records, I see a need to limit myself to scholarly journals only, so I will change to another search strategy.

Search Strategy - Successive Fractions

1. Since this information is to be used for support on an academic research paper, I will limit my results to peer reviewed. This reduced the records to 27. None of these are really what I am needing.
2. I will use a proximity search and start again.
3. New search: (student achievementtechnology or computer*) and child*. Also, I am still limiting to peer reviewed. Records retrieved 146.
4. Within these 146, I limited my search to media center or library and it reduced my records to 78. The "search within these results" feature is a handy tool. Only three articles look like possibilities. Most of them are reviews not critical analysis. I'm not having much success, so I'll try another strategy.

Search Strategy - Citation Pearl Growing

1. In looking at the citations for some of the articles that I thought might be more helpful, I found new terms to search. New search: (librar* or media center or school libraries) and (microcomputers or computer* or technology) and student achievement. I continue to limit my results to peer reviewed. Results - 9 records.
2. One was a winner, so I looked at the citation for this one and found a new term, academic achievement.
3. New search: (librar* or media center or school libraries) and (microcomputers or computer* or technology) and academic achievement. Once again 9 records, but not the exact same ones. One new record to mix which was a good one also. The citation for this new article supplied another new term digital divide. I'll try one more search.
4. New search: (librar* or media center or school libraries) and (microcomputers or computer* or technology) and academic achievement and digital divide. I guess I was going too far. I only received one record which is the one I found previously.

Search Strategy - Search Browsing

1. This database has a browse tab, so I selected it. I browsed the subject - digital divide. There are 182 records under this subject. I clicked on the subject "digital divide" from the listed results and received 175 records. I have no idea what happened to the 7 records that were not displayed.
2. I searched the 175 records for achievement or learning and received 7 records. I found nothing new in these 7, so I returned to my 175.
3. I then narrowed by subject - Internet/school libraries. I received 3 records. Two of them might be useful. I have notice through my searches that a particular author comes up frequently - Doug Johnson.

Reflections

In this database, browsing is much easier than in some others. My results were smaller in this database than in others. I could be because I have learned to narrow my search or perhaps this database contains much less on the topic. Of the strategies that I tried in this database, successive fractions did not seem to be as useful. I have found an author's name that could be someone to watch for in future searches.