Information
Literacy Competency Exam Spring 1999
This competency examination will test your information literacy and research skills. To complete the examination you will employ all of the concepts and resources you learned in INFS 1000, or in the Information Literacy Tutorial. You are expected to complete this examination on your own. You are not to ask any librarian, faculty member, or fellow student for assistance. If you have any specific questions about this exam, please talk to Tom Eland, Anne Ryan, or Jane Jurgens.
To complete the examination you must choose one of the topics listed below and then proceed through the guidelines. Assume you are writing a 10 page research paper for your English composition course. You need to include between 12-15 sources in support of your research. You will want to collect sources that will be appropriate for writing such a paper. You are to write this exam in a narrative format and justify all your choices. In grading the exam I will consider the rationale you provide to justify your choice of specific items. I will also grade you on your choice of resource selection (i.e., indexes, reference books, databases, etc.). More points will be awarded for the use of appropriate resources (i.e., those that cover your chosen topic). The exam will take between 8 to 10 hours to complete.
As you write your examination you must cite all the reference resources you use as well as the individual magazine articles, books and web sites you select. Base your citations on the MLA style guidelines. (The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 4th ed., and Electronic Styles: A Handbook for Citing Electronic Information are both located in the reference room at 808.02. Citations do not need to conform exactly to the MLA guidelines; but they must contain all the relevant information needed for me to locate the resource.
· Teenage drinking
· Sex, violence and the media
· Gay rights
· Eating disorders
· Hate crimes
· Women and employment
· Regulating the Internet
· Distopias/utopias
· Athletes and drugs
· Housing discrimination
Remember, you will most likely need to narrow your topic further. You must also decide the particular angle from which you will approach your topic, i.e., ethical moral, social, political, scientific, cross-cultural, etc. The more specific you can be about your topic the better.
Guidelines
1. Choose a research topic from the list on the previous page.
a. Create a research strategy for your topic. Specify the particular aspects of the topic you wish to focus on, (e.g., ethical/religious, social, political, scientific, etc.). Write down your research strategy and the particular aspects of the topic upon which you wish to focus.
b. Write down the main questions that you’ll want to answer about your topic. Stating your topic in the form of questions will help you focus your research.
c. Write a thesis sentence that summarizes the main points of your paper. Writing a thesis statement helps you to further focus your research.
d. Write down the keywords and subject headings that you think will help you best locate information on your topic. These keywords and subject headings will be helpful to you when you search databases. (Hint: the Library of Congress Subject Headings books, print magazine indexes and encyclopedias can be very helpful in providing you with keywords and subject headings).
e. Now that you have your keywords and subject headings written down, consider whether you need to combine some of the keywords or subject headings to broaden or narrow your search. Think about how you could combine keywords to broaden or narrow your search.
If you need assistance in performing the above steps, you might want to refer to and print off the Defining Your Research Topic worksheet located on the course web page.
2. Locate 2-3 reference books that will provide you with appropriate background information on your topic. Provide a citation for each reference book and justify why you think each reference book will help you write your research paper. If you choose not to use reference books you must provide a good explanation for why you don't think they are helpful for your topic. If you cannot find any reference books related to your topic you must let me know how you attempted to search for the books.
(Hints for locating reference books: Are there any reference books listed in the online catalog that will enhance your understanding of the topic? Have you looked at your Dewey Decimal handout to try and locate where in the reference room you could look for resources on your topic?)
3. Now that your topic is well-defined, identify some good books as well as general magazines and scholarly journal articles (8-10 total) that will elaborate on your topic.
a. Justify why you think each book and article you found is valuable for writing your paper; include the criteria you used for evaluating the items for reliability, authority, accuracy, presence or absence of bias.
b. Make sure to include magazine and journal articles as well as books.
c. Make sure to tell me whether any of the books and articles are available in the MCTC Library. If you locate a book in another library tell me which library.
d. Make sure to tell me if any of the articles are available full-text online.
e. If MCTC Library does not own an article, and it is not available full-text online, how would you retrieve a copy of the article?
4. Are there any good Web sites that offer further research on your topic? (Try to locate at least 2 Web sites)
a. Tell me the specific search engine(s) that you used.
b. Tell me exactly how you searched for the information. If you used a keyword search provide me with the exact search phrase, including any special limiting commands such as phrase searching or truncation. If you searched using the browse feature of the search engine tell me which categories you chose.
c. Be sure to print off the first page of the Web site and attach it to the end of your exam. Make sure that the URL of the site is printed on the page.
d. Justify why you think the information you found is valuable for writing your paper including the criteria you used for evaluating the content of the Web site for reliability, authority, accuracy, presence or absence of bias.
5. Are there other resources that are appropriate for your topic, e.g. government publications, statistics, handbooks, yearbooks, bibliographies? If so please identify them and tell me why you think they are valuable for your topic.
6. Remember, I am looking to see that you understand the research process and that you know how to locate and use the appropriate tools for your particular topic. Make sure to provide me with information on how you searched for your material and why you selected your particular resources.
Ground Rules:
Budget your time and plan on the exam taking you between 8 to 10 hours to complete. Do not ask any librarians, faculty or students for help with your exam. If you have questions about the exam or the process, talk to Tom Eland, Anne Ryan or Jane Jurgens. You may consult the Information Literacy Tutorial, your textbook, notes and course handouts to help you complete the exam