This webinar introduces Guide to Reference, an online reference tool for librarians, researchers, and students. It provides over 17,000 evaluated reference sources across various disciplines. The webinar demonstrates how Guide to Reference can help with reference questions, collection development, and teaching by allowing users to quickly search and filter sources, read in-depth annotations, and save customized lists. Challenges like budget cuts and an over-reliance on search engines are also addressed. The webinar encourages participants to take advantage of the Guide's subject organization, editorial guides, and ability to save searches.
2. Guide to Reference
Essentials Webinar
Welcome
Today we’ll introduce you to Guide to
Reference, a foundational tool for
librarians, teachers, researchers,
students, and other library users. We’ll
show you how it can help you in your
work.
3. Our goal today
We’ll show you how to leverage Guide
to Reference to support your work in
the following areas:
» Reference
» Collection development
» Teaching and training
4. Who we are
Melissa Wood
Marketing & Sales Manager, ALA Digital Reference
Dan Kaplan
Marketing Manager, ALA Publishing
Special Guest
Denise Beaubien Bennett
General Editor of Guide to Reference
5. Preliminaries
If you have questions, please submit them
through the questions function during the
presentation.
We’ll collect your questions and answer them
during the webinar and during the Q&A at the
end.
For any technical difficulties, please send a
questions to Dan Kaplan.
6. Library Journal’s 2012 Best
Database
Library Journal named Guide to
Reference as the Best Database in
the Professional Resource Category
in 2012.
This award was based on votes from
librarians, readers of LJ, and
reviewers.
7. Guide to Reference is
―(1) a reference manual . . . ; (2) a selection
aid for the librarian; (3) a textbook for the
student who . . . is pursuing a systematic
study of reference books.‖
Constance Winchell
Preface to the 8th edition, 1967
8. The premier evaluative
bibliography
» Reflects the accumulated knowledge and
wisdom of the reference community over
many years
» Continues to serve as a center for learning
about and practicing reference
librarianship
» Some call it ―the Bible‖ of reference
sources
9. How does the Guide do it?
» It’s selective and broad in coverage
» It gives you nearly 17,000 of the best and
most authoritative reference sources in 56
disciplines arranged under 6 major subject
divisions, with in-depth annotations
» It’s kept up-to-date by an Editorial Board
and 70+ contributing editors—your
colleagues and peers in the reference
community
» greditor@ala.org
10. Traditional strengths
» Titles are chosen by reference librarians
and subject experts
» In-depth evaluative annotations
» Broad subject coverage: General
Reference Works; Humanities; Social and
Behavioral Sciences; History and Area
Studies; Science, Technology, and
Medicine
11. New strengths
» Sources include cutting-edge online
resources and websites, free and licensed
» Powerful and versatile search and browse
» Interactive features that let you save and
share your work
» New interdisciplinary fields: Cognitive
Science; Communication/Media Studies;
Environmental, Cultural, and Gender
Studies
12. The advantages of being
online
» Quickly browse and search in many
subject areas
» Customize and save your searches
» Create lists of resources and share
» Add notes/comments to titles and share
» Hyperlink among titles inside and outside
the Guide
» Connect to local holdings via WorldCat
13. Reference
» Direct library users to best and most
authoritative sources for answers
» Train and orient new reference staff and
students/paraprofessional staff
» Create subject bibliographies, finding
aids, and instructional materials
14. Reference: Current
Challenges
» Reference questions are fewer but
―harder‖
» More questions require subject or content
knowledge
» Too much dependence on Google and
other search engines
15. Reference: How the Guide
can help
» Find best sources quickly by drilling down
into taxonomy and by refining searches
» Use Editor’s Guides for orientation
» Use annotations for guidance
» Create lists of resources for bibliographies
and finding aids
» Save your best searches for regular use
16. Collection development
» Evaluate your collection:
» What’s missing
» What needs to be updated
» What should be retired
» Build collections for new programs and for
special libraries (law, medicine,
corporate)
17. Collection Development
Current Challenges
» Making do with less: Budget cuts
» Print vs. online sources
» Buying for library staff vs. library users
» Small collection development staff; limited
staff time
18. Collection Development
How the Guide can help
» Use Editor’s Guides to understand shape
and direction of reference literature
» Use annotations to compare resources
» Create lists of titles for possible purchase
and share with colleagues
» Add notes/comments to titles that should
be updated or retired
» Customize and save searches to run at
regular intervals
19. Teaching and Training
» Introduce next generation of reference
librarians to reference sources and
reference practices
» Differentiate among types of reference
sources and their value and use
» Communicate nature of information-
seeking and reference process
20. Teaching and Training
Current Challenges
» Value of bibliographies and traditional
reference works in an online world
» Difference between print and online
sources
» Too much dependence on Google and
other search engines
21. Teaching and Training
How the Guide can help
» Orient students to the taxonomy
» Ask students to read Editor’s Guides
» Ask students to evaluate different
resources based on their annotations
» Ask students to find best resources for
answering questions
» Ask students to create subject guides
» Create lists of resources for class projects
22. Three major points of entry
» Home page – take a trial; subscribe;
participate and connect
» Browse page – see the subject
organization of the Guide at a glance
» Advanced Search page – construct and
manage your searches
23. Take advantage of Editor’s
Guides
» They discuss overall shape of reference
literature in different subject areas
» They discuss characteristics of the
literature outside the scope of annotations
» They discuss changes to publishing and
research patterns caused by the online
revolution
» They’re written by the Editorial Board and
contributing editors
24. If you like your search,
save it and run it later
25. Wrapping up
» Taking a trial
» Subscribing
» Special offer for LIS programs
» We’ll archive this webinar
» guidetoreference@ala.org
» greditor@ala.org
27. Guide to Reference Essentials
Webinars
» Recurring series of webinars every
other month
» Please tell your colleagues about the
webinars
» Join us again
» We welcome any feedback
» Contact us at:
guidetoreference@ala.org
Notas del editor
It is likely that many of you have already encountered the print GR in your training as a librarian. Certainly the print version served as a cornerstone of reference librarianship and training in the past century and today the online version has only increased the depth of coverage and the power of the classic brand. Today will touch on some of the philosophy that shapes GR and also cover its practical and current applications.
These are the primary areas where you can really leverage GR in your work.We will also talk about FREE access later for you and your LIS programs later in the webinar
We will also archive the slides and video of this presentation sometime next week.
We hope that because of this award voted on by your peers, you’ll want to at the very least take advantage of the free 60 Day trial after this webinar.
Historically GR is a large, even huge print volume. We feel this quotation is still relevant of the online version, and that the mission of GR has always remained that same.
Denise tell a story about how Guide to Reference came in handy for you or one of the other editors?
New volunteers welcome.Email us at greditor@ala.org if you’d like to be involved?Denise- http://www.guidetoreference.org/DynamicContent.aspx?ctype=13
Editors put a lot of work into the annotations and this provides the value of really helping you make decisions about titles.Very complete Taxomony that outlines human knowledge.
Copy editors have commented on the extensive coverage of online resources, and we think this shows how smart and savvy reference librarians are.IP authentication for your campus - save searches by logging in though both locally and globally
Three of our goals at GR are to help three major areas, Reference, Collection Development and Teaching & training. First up is Reference
We’ve talked to a lot of reference librarians and these challenges came up quite a bit. We believe that GR addresses these issues
EG give you an overview of ref lit and publishing practices in a subject area.
Our second goal at Guide to Reference is helping with Collection Development. We’ve worked quite a bit with folks who are starting a new program and needed to build up that section of the library. Or starting a new specialized library.
Tight budgets prohibit buying for staff use.
And of course, it’s constantly being updated.
We offer long term complimentary access to LIS classes.
Now, let’s take a look at the guide. Browse page particularly useful for LIS instructors introducing their students to reference work.
We’ll be holding this webinar again in two months so please feel free to join us again and don’t forget to invite your colleagues, too.When this webinar is over you’ll will be given a short survey to fill out. Let us know what you think about this webinar—your feedback is important to us.