This was the second largest bibliography project that I have ever created.  The largest was my senior paper for my Language Arts degree.  I had three sources per page, and that paper turned into a fifty page paper.  How I have grown as a researcher since my initial explorations is I had a narrower focus.  This came from using the Thesarus first.  I was able to explore ideas that I had concerns about, and then by using descriptors that they had branching off from those terms I was able to have a more narrow frame work then what I have done in the past.  In the past, I would have found one book on a subject and then I would have gone to the shelves and tried to look through the books that were next to that book.  Why did this work better?  I feel the main difference came from the abstracts which helped me to illuminate some of the articles that were not relevant to my explorations.  When examining books on the shelf, there is no way to know if that book will meet your needs until you've read it.  The abstracts provide the information most pertinent to my concerns and then I was able to select and draw from that to meet the purpose of my searches.
  One of the main questions I had when beginning the search was what information was available to me as a first year teacher on subjects like special education, ESL, and discipline, which are all concerns that affected me greatly during  the first portion of my teaching.  I was pleased with the outcome of my searches because I was able to find at least one article or document of interest on all of the twenty topics I was originally exploring.
  I feel this is a benefit to me for other classes because as I am learning to teach, I will be able to order the articles on technology, special education, ESL, and discipline without feeling like I am wandering around in the dark on these topics.  I feel a great benefit from awareness is that it helps reduce the isolation and frustration that comes from being a first year teacher.  Instead of throwing my hands up and saying I do not know where to go with this student, I could search the ERIC database on my subject of concern and find materials, lesson plans, and articles that would help me differentiate and work with individual students needs.
   I feel positive about the work that was accomplished, and how easy it is to search on ERIC once you have the right criteria to search with.  I felt like that I was able to narrow down my search criteria by adding on my specialized area, and I feel the results were specific enough that I could get a feel for what was available on Middle Schools education.  I felt reading the articles made me feel that the project had more valid information.  I know that being in an educational database these articles and papers have been screened once, but in reading them I get a true sense of what I can use and what I need to discard.
   I do not know that I can classify my information retrieved as the highest quality and or the most current, because in truth ideas are in constant motion.  I do know that the majority of my papers and articles are from the late 1980's to the present.  I did chose some older articles, because I felt this would give me perspective about what I was doing.  Some of the great ideas about education have actually been around a long time, but for political or other reasons have never totally taken off.  I feel like having a few older articles in the mix is good way for me to get a perspective about some of the ideas and processes I am looking at. 
  The biggest influence that came from this search and readings is that now I have a greater understanding of my role as a teacher.  I see from what I have read so far that my attitude towards change and reform are a big factor in a schools success and failure.  I doubt that I really saw how my role effected the way technology would be integrated on a school level, but now I see that in fact one of the most important factors in this reform is the classroom teacher which I am.

Page Author: Danielle Earley
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