Sample Lesson Materials

Middle School Library Media: Research Databases

Lesson Basics

Grade Level: 6th through 8th grade

Content Area: Library Media, plus ELA and Social Studies

Lesson Title: Introduction to Research Databases

Learning Objective: Students will be able to identify keywords in research questions and use boolean operators in order to create specific search phrases to search research databases for their National History Day project.

Instructional Video

This video has embedded questions on Screencastify. As a note, students cannot rewind and skip forward until they answer all questions. Then, they can do so as much as they need. 

Screencastify link can be found here.

Guided Notes

These guided notes target key points in the instructional video that are critical for students to understand to master the objective. I have included a combination of guided notes with a traditional chart and images and a section with a real-time application to check for understanding before moving on to the classwork. 

Practice Work

For the practice, I often have students apply what they learned in the instructional video at a deeper level. 

In this particular lesson, students are engaging in a practice task that will set them up for success with their own research questions. 

Mastery Check

Assessing mastery can come in many forms. For this lesson, I chose a quick 5-question gamified assessment (Quizizz) to get a quick pulse of whether students understand what keywords are, how to identify the keywords in a research question, and how to use boolean search terms properly. 

If students can demonstrate mastery of these key objectives, they are ready to begin searching databases. 

Progress Tracker

I enjoy using the auto-updating progress tracker created by MCP. It is helpful to stay organized and provides a quick visual for students. 

In the linked example, I have deleted student names but suggest using first names or nicknames when implementing. 

I left an example of how to complete the spreadsheet. “X” means the student completed it; "O” means they have not. “R” indicates that the student needs to revise. Check the “editable” tab to see the actual tracker.