While the explosion of the Internet has made information readily
available, academia has become more critical when evaluating sources. Simply
because it exists online doesn’t imply credibility. Anyone can make a website.
Thus many school assignments, such as the infamous research paper, hinge
on citing sources worthy of academic standing.
It’s a rite of passage for students to complete multiple research
papers. Despite that, discovering them in a syllabus can often be met with a
sinking feeling of dread. This is followed shortly by visions of being chained
to a library desk or computer screen for countless hours.
Luckily, Google has streamlined the research process. No more wasting
valuable hours. Just use Google Scholar to sort through thousands of
academically vetted resources.
Think Like a Researcher
Google Scholar sorts through and retrieves “articles, theses, books,
abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies,
online repositories, universities and other websites.”
Everything you could need for academic research is a few clicks away.
They went to great efforts to weigh articles with the mind of a
researcher. Ranking is based on when it was published, author, publication
location and how many times other scholarly articles cite it.
Archive Resources
All the functionality of a library is now at your fingertips! But rather
than checking out material, you can just archive it. If you are in the initial
stages of compiling research, you can save them to your virtual Scholar
Library. Just flag any interesting articles for reviewing later.
Forever a Scholar
Google Scholar isn’t just for students. It’s a powerful tool for
academic writers. Through the citation tool, authors can easily keep track of
their articles and who is citing them. In typical Google form, authors can even
pull metrics on their articles.
Limitations
The one downside comes in retrieval. Many of the articles and journals
highlighted in these searches are subscription based. Google is trying to
lesson the gap through partnering with libraries to leverage their
subscriptions. While this has increased accessing electronic resources, it’s
not a perfect system.
One tip for navigating this problem is to partner with your local or
school library. Use Google Scholar to identify publications beneficial to your
research. Save them to your library. Then utilize your library’s subscriptions
to unlock the documents.
Conclusion
Technology continues to open doors and broaden our perspective. When
applied to education, this has created countless opportunities for students.
If you want to learn more about how technology has revolutionized the
high school experience in Coronado, check out Coronado
Pathways Charter School. We are pushing the boundaries on what
education can enable our students to achieve.
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