Education Subject Guide
Getting Started
When refining a research topic in education, it often helps to consult some of the standard reference works before searching for books and journal articles. A good article in a specialized encyclopedia can give you the necessary background you need to get started and can help suggest keywords or other avenues of research.
You can look for relevant sources in the reference book collection on the first floor, near the circulation desk, generally in the L section. You can also ask me or the librarian at the Reference Desk for assistance in finding appropriate reference sources.
Finding Books
Searching
Searching TIGER by keyword or subject is often the fastest way to find books about your topic.
For books that we don’t own here at Colorado College, or books that are checked out or otherwise unavailable, use Prospector - Colorado Unified Catalog . You’ll find books (and CDs, DVDs, etc.) in libraries across Colorado that you can request and have sent to the Tutt Library circulation desk where you can check them out.
For books not available in TIGER or Prospector, you can request through Interlibrary Loan via WorldCat .
Please ask a librarian if you need help with TIGER, Prospector, or WorldCat.
Browsing
Books about education are assigned call numbers that begin with:
- L General Education
- LA History of education
- LB Theory and practice of education
- LC Special aspects of education
- LD Individual institutions – United States
- LE Individual institutions – Americas other than U.S.
- LF Individual institutions – Europe
- LG Individual institutions – Asia, Africa, Oceania
- LH College and school magazines and papers
- LJ Student fraternities and societies
- LT Textbooks
Also, Tutt Library has a Curriculum Collection on the 3rd floor, with textbooks and materials to use in classrooms.
Finding Articles
There are a number of databases to consult for articles on education topics. For empirical articles, you may want to start with ERIC or Education Abstracts; for more general articles, Academic Search Premier is a good database to try.
Complete list of databases for education
- Children's Literature Review
- Online, full-text literary criticism, anthologized and excerpted from books and journal articles. Criticism of classic to modern children's authors. Part of Literature Critcism Online
- Education Abstracts
- Coverage: 1983 - current
- Subjects include administration, teaching methods and curriculum, literacy, government funding, and more.
- ERIC
- Coverage: 1966 - current
- References to thousands of educational topics. Includes journal articles, books, theses, curriculi, conference papers, and standards and guidelines.
- K-12 Resources (Ebsco)
- Coverage: 1984 - current
- Resource package developed by EBSCO for elementary and secondary schools containing full text resources including a Funk & Wagnalls Encyclopedia, an animal database, and periodical databases aimed at children and young adults (Primary Search, Middle Search Plus, and MAS Ultra - School Edition).
- MAS Ultra-school Edition
- Specifically designed for high school students with full text of 500 periodicals, 350 reference books, 100,000 primary source documents, 84,700 biographies - plus over 235,000 photos, maps, and flags
- Middle Search Plus
- For middle and junior high school students, with 140 full text titles (with Lexile reading level), as well as historical essays, 84,700 biographies, over 235,000 images, and 100,000 primary source documents.
- Primary Search
- Primary Search contains full text for over 80 popular, elementary school magazines. All full text articles are assigned a reading level indicator (Lexiles). Also includes the Encyclopedia of Animals, Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia, the American Heritage Children's Dictionary, and thousands of relevant photos, maps and flags.
- Professional Development Collection
- Coverage: 1984 - current
- Highly specialized collection of nearly 440 full text journals, designed for professional educators.
- PsycARTICLES
- Coverage: 1988 - current
- Full text articles on current issues in psychology, general psychology, and specialized, basic, applied, clinical and theoretical research in psychology, covering journals published by the American Psychological Association and other allied organizations. NOTE: You can search both PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES at the same time. Contact Reference Desk x6662.
- PsycINFO
- Coverage: 1887 - current
- Comprehensive international database of psychology. Covers the academic, research, and practice literature in psychology. NOTE: You can search both PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES at the same time. Contact Reference Desk x6662.
- Teacher Reference Center
- Coverage: varies
- Popular trade journals, periodicals and books covering key educational topics, such as asssessment, continuing education, current pedagogical research, curriculum development, instructional media, language arts, literacy standards, science and mathematics.
- Web Of Knowledge
- Coverage: 1900 - current
- Citation-based searching in all disciplines. Includes Science Citation Index (1900-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1900-present), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present). Web of Knowledge differs from Web of Science by including other databases such as Medline.
- Web Of Science
- Coverage: 1900 - current
- Citation-based searching in all disciplines. Includes Science Citation Index (1900-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1900-present), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present). Web of Science differs from Web of Knowledge by focusing on these three indexes.