Investigation

• • You need to start looking for clues! Was this pearl necklace involved somehow?

This is where the real detective work starts to happen. You will want to access a range of different types of information. It is important to make good choices from reliable sources during this section of the research process.

Selecting your sources

• • There are a wide range of sources available eg books, articles in databases, material on the internet, website, curated content, newspapers and magazines, dvds etc  These are all available through our school library - ask our librarians if you need help

  • EPIC databases contain full text articles from thousands of periodicals, newspapers, magazines, journals, reference works and books. They also hold images, videos etc. Material on databases is fact-checked, often peer reviewed and is often not available on the internet.  Watch this short video to learn more about databases.

  • NB : If you are using the databases from home you will be asked to log-in.  The user name is: ashs and the password is : library

  • The Library also have a collection of Livebinders on ASHS research topics that have links to online resources, databases and journals.

  • You can access primary sources (original, firsthand and often unedited eg letters, photographs, documents) These sources are often digitalised and available a variety of websites eg The National Library of New Zealand https://natlib.govt.nz/, Statistics New Zealand for Census detail etc www.stats.govt.nz/ or secondary sources (material derived from primary sources eg articles, textbooks, reviews, essays etc)

  • For more information on defining Primary Sources see:  

    • Primary sources — how to use them

Internet Clues

There is more to life than Google and using other search engines can give you more focused and reliable results

• • Useful search engines include: Google Scholar (articles etc from academic institutions); 

    • Carrot2 (clusters results to expand or refine searches, links to other relevant search engines);  

Duck Duck Go (gives a fresh search each time);  

RefSeek - Academic Search Engine (An Academic search engine for students and researchers. Locates relevant academic search results from web pages, books, encyclopedias & journals);   

Sweet Search https://www.sweetsearch.com/   (A search engine for students that emphasizes high quality resources evaluated and approved by educators, librarians and research experts.)

Search Tips

• • Searching books? Make sure you use the contents page and index to find relevant material. Use the source’s bibliography to find other relevant sources.

  • Searching internet and databases?

    • Use quote marks to search for exact word or phrase eg “Great Fire of London”

    • Use OR to broaden search to include two or more key words eg children OR youth

    • Use an Asterix * to broaden search eg diet* will give your results for diet, dietary

    • Use 'NOT' or '-' to refine your search eg teen NOT children

    • Use # in front of a word to search hashtags e.g.  #throwbackthursday

    • Using '+' to make sure a word is included in your search

    • Use 'site:nz' for finding information from NZ sites

    • Use 'site:ac' for finding information from universities or colleges

    • Use 'site:edu' for finding information american universities and colleges sites

Recording bibliographic details

• Make sure that your record accurate information of each source as you access them (eg for books: author, title, publisher and date, place, date, page references; for websites author,  site address, date etc. You will need this information later for footnotes and your bibliography

Use the student activity 'information investigation' to help with this task