Freegal - Week of July 29 to August 5

Freegal is a database that offers library patrons 3 FREE MP3 downloads per week. Downloads are free of DRM restrictions and are for patrons to KEEP. Patrons have one week to use up their 3 week quota, with downloads refreshing on Sundays at 11:59 PM. Patrons can use the database from either their home computer or by downloading the app that works on both Apple or Android devices. Freegal offers an extensive collection of songs from a variety of genres primarily from artists signed to Sony labels. This means the site is not as comprehensive as something like iTunes or Amazon MP3, but there is still a lot of music to discover, and plenty of classic and new artists worth digging for.

Fregal has many features on its front page that promotes its newest releases. In the middle of the front page is a horizontal scrolling menu with the latest popular releases, as well as a large picture of some of the more recent major acquisitions. There is also a link to News on the top menu bar of the homepage that will take you to a blog detailing major site news and kep you informed of upcoming releases. Just below the scrolling bar are links to various Charts of the most downloaded tracks on the site. There are charts for different genres, for the Top 100 nationwide, and for the Top 10 tracks downloaded from our library system. You can ususally find the latest major singles or popular artists by scrolling through one of these lists. All tracks on the site have a 30 second sample that can be accessed by clicking on the play button next to their name.

If a patron needs to re-download a song, there is a link to Recent Downloads on the menu bar on the front page that will show them all of their downloads over the past two weeks. These songs can be downloaded a total of two extra times.

The FAQ, also found on the menu bar, offers general guidance and information about using the site. Patrons can find short instructions here on how to download the songs to their computers, transfer files to iTunes, and finding and using the App for their Apple and Android products.

Searching the website is admittedly not the easiest thing in the world. Though there are multiple ways to search, they all tend to return results by the track, so a simple artist search can be clogged with hundreds of tracks from similar sounding artists before you find the artist you are looking for. The site also offers A to Z artist and Genre browsing options, but these also require paging through hundreds of results.

For example, the pictures above are from an artist search and a browse search for the artist “Journey”. As you can see, they are not very helpful. Your best bet if you are having trouble finding an artist that you know for sure is on the site is to use the Advanced Search feature and search by at least two different fields, such as Artist and Song.

Clicking on the artist name will bring you to a page with all available albums by that artist.

As most of the site is comprised of Sony label artists, it’s often easier to suggest to patrons that they look at a list of those artists rather than letting them get discouraged by plugging in names of artists who most likely aren’t available.   The major Sony label is RCA Records, so a quick visit to the artist page of their website (http://www.rcarecords.com/artists) will give patrons a good visual representation of the more popular music available.  Another good resource for this is actually Wikipedia, which has lists of artists signed to both RCA records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_RCA_Records_artists) and Sony (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Sony_Music_artists).  Just be aware that these are lists of every artist who has ever been signed to these labels, so some of the artists listed may not be currently signed to Sony and thus not available on Freegal.   That’s a distinct minority of these lists, however, and they are very good resources to suggest to patrons who are having trouble navigating the site. 

Heritage Quest - Week of July 22 - 28

HeritageQuest

This collection of unique material is for both genealogical and historical researchers, with coverage dating back to the late 1700s. Use HeritageQuest to assist patrons in finding their ancestors, trace their paths across America, and learn what life was like in the areas where they settled.

The Census is the most important part of HeritageQuest but some of its other databases are useful as well.  Please note that the index in HeritageQuest is not complete for the last two Censuses (1930 & 1940).

(Note:the Florida/Genealogy Department recommends  Ancestry Library Edition as the best place to start a beginning patron who wants to start their family history. Ancestry was a previously featured database in the Bedazzling Database training and is archived in this blog. However, Ancestry can only be accessed from within a library branch unlike HeritageQuest which your patrons can conveniently access from home.)

NBC Learn - Week of July 15 through July 21

 

 

The NBC Learn databases allow users to access thousands of engaging and informative resources that may be used for personal research, be incorporated into the classroom, or be used to supplement an online learning program.  The databases target two broad education levels: K-12 and Higher Education.  The K-12 resources complement the school curriculum by including subject areas such as Social Studies, Science, and Language Arts.  It is searchable by grade level, state, and subject.  The Higher Education database complements college-level courses by covering subjects such as Global Studies, Business, and Sociology.  The NBC Learn resources consist of brief videos (2-5 minutes in length), documents, images, and audio files. 

The most distinguishing feature of the NBC Learn databases is the CueCard, which functions as a video player, image and document viewer and flash card. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Cue Card incorporates a “patented flip card technology” that allows the viewer to “flip” the card over to see additional information while watching a video or viewing a document or image.  This additional information includes the source, the creator, the air/publish date, the copyright date, a description, and a citation.  While watching a video, a full transcript may be easily accessed by clicking on the Transcript link located along the right side of the Cue Card.  Most videos and documents are accompanied by transcripts.  Videos also include a Closed Captioning feature.  Both the Cue Card and the accompanying transcripts are printable.

A Cue Card also may be saved by adding it to MyPlaylists, a personal library that allows easy access to resources that the user may want to view again.  By clicking on the Save tab located at the bottom of an opened Cue Card, the viewer can save the card to an existing playlist or to a new playlist.  My Playlists may be accessed by clicking on the link located along the main navigation bar that appears at the top of every page.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition, NBC Learn offers users the option to download their videos for future viewing, sharing, and embedding in documents and presentations.  Downloading videos requires the installation of their Offline Video Player, a program that enables the user to view, organize and share downloaded NBC Learn Cue Cards. 

 

Sharing a Cue Card to colleagues, students, friends, or family is easy.  To share a resource, simply click on the Share tab located at the bottom of an opened Cue Card and select an internet service.  (To see a full list of internet services to which a Cue Card may be shared, click on More… from the Share options.)  The Cue Card link also may be shared by copying the URL link and pasting it into emails, documents, and presentations.  The videos are cleared to use for educational purposes, so users wishing to share the videos through presentations, etc. do not have to worry about copyright infringement.

Since NBC Learn is subscription-based, the user must first be sure that their educational institution is subscribed to the service.  Non-subscribers who receive a link to an NBC Learn resource will only be able to see a 15-second preview.  Normally, the database will prompt the user to enter a registration code for their institution.  Once the code is accepted, the user may create a personal account that allows full access to the NBC Learn resources, including the creation of playlists.  For users entering the database through the MDPLS website, however, the database already recognizes Miami-Dade Public Library as a subscribed institution and the user only needs to create a personal account.

Opposing Viewpoints | Week of July 8 to July 14

Opposing Viewpoints in Context is a wonderful online resource covering today's hottest social issues, from Offshore Drilling to Climate Change, Health Care to Immigration. Opposing Viewpoints in Context helps students research, analyze and organize a broad variety of data for conducting research, completing writing assignments, preparing for debates and creating presentations.

In addition to the engaging, streamlined interface and media-rich topic pages, this resource offers a rich collection of content and curriculum-focused tools that help students explore issues from all perspectives:

• Pro / Con viewpoint essays
• Topic overviews
• Biographies of social activists and reformers
• Court-case overviews
• Periodical articles
• Statistical tables, charts and graphs
• Podcasts, including weekly presidential addresses and premier NPR programs
• A national and state curriculum standards search, correlated to the content that allows educators to quickly identify material by grade and discipline

Opposing Viewpoints in Context contains more than 700 Greenhaven Press, Gale, Macmillan Reference USA, Charles Scribner's Sons and U*X*L titles. New reference content is added on an ongoing basis, and new full-text periodical and newspaper articles are added every day.

Please view a brief video on navigating the Opposing Viewpoints homepage:

Click here for Video 1

Here's another brief video tutorial on Searching - featuring the Advanced Search interface:

Click here for Video 2