Information Skills workshops for PhD researchers: now open for booking

As you begin, or continue your PhD it is important that you feel confident that you are locating and managing all the literature and information you require to achieve your research aims.

The Library Service is here to support your research so we will be running a series of Information Skills Workshops starting at the end of October 2019. The workshops’ aim is to help you understand the resources available to you as researchers here at the University of Aberdeen, and how to get the best out of them. Read on for further information on the workshops.

29, 30 & 31 October
Literature searching – Part 1: Planning, Primo and Google

5, 6 & 7 November
Literature searching – Part 2: Databases

12, 13 & 14 November 
Literature searching – Part 3: Managing References with RefWorks

Across the three parts, we will look at:

  • Planning your search
  • Looking for books: using Primo and E-books
  • Databases of academic literature
  • Getting the best out of Google
  • Managing your references with RefWorks
  • Formatting Word documents with in-text citations and bibliographies

Feedback from those who have previously attended these sessions has been positive and highlights how after attending, students felt better equipped to find and manage the materials they need for research. One quote from a previous attendee nicely sums up what we are aiming for with these sessions:

“I will definitely be searching smarter than before”

Our aim is that after you attend, you will also leave feeling this way.

IMPORTANT NOTE: The sessions focusing on the management of references is not suitable for research postgraduates in the School of Law, as the software used does not support the OSCOLA referencing style required for legal theses.

To find out more, and to book onto the different workshops please visit www.abdn.ac.uk/coursebooking and look for Information Skills classes. Please note that we will be offering three sessions on each part, with the Tuesday & Thursday sessions lasting 2 hours and the Wednesday sessions lasting 3 hours.

In the meantime, do not forget that Library staff are always here to help with any information needs that you may have. Visit our website for further information on our services. We look forward to seeing you at the workshops!

PhD Literature Searching workshops open for booking

As you begin, or continue, your PhD it is important that you feel confident that you are locating and managing all the literature and information you require to achieve your research aims. For researchers like yourself the University’s Library Service is here to support you.

We are running a short series of Information Skills Workshops in February 2019 which will help you understand the library resources available to you as researchers here at the University of Aberdeen, and how to get the best out of them. Read on for further information on the workshops. To book workshops visit www.abdn.ac.uk/coursebooking and look for Library Information Skills classes.

There are three workshops on offer, each lasting two hours:

  • Literature searching – Part 1: Getting started
  • Literature searching – Part 2: Using databases
  • Literature searching – Part 3: Managing your references using RefWorks

Across the three workshops we will look at:

  • Planning your search
  • Looking for books: using Primo and E-books
  • Databases of academic literature
  • Getting the best out of Google
  • Managing your references with RefWorks
  • Formatting Word documents with in-text citations and bibliographies

Feedback from those who have previously attended these sessions have been positive and they highlight how after attending they felt better equipped to find and manage the materials they need for research. One quote from a previous attendee nicely sums up what we are aiming for with these sessions:

“I will definitely be searching smarter than before”

Our aim is that after you attend you will also leave feeling this way.

IMPORTANT NOTE: The sessions focusing on the management of references is not suitable for research postgraduates in the School of Law, as the software used does not support the OSCOLA referencing style required for legal theses.

To find out more, and to book onto the different workshops please visit www.abdn.ac.uk/coursebooking and look for Information Skills classes. We look forward to seeing you at the workshops.

In the meantime, do not forget that Library staff are always here to help with any information needs that you may have. Visit our website for further information on our services.

Free Library Skills workshops to help you Find it Fast!

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At the Library we believe you should be spending the majority of your time reading materials and not looking for them, so we have a range of workshops to help you learn how to get your hands on the best books, articles, reports and other information in the shortest time possible.

These are our Find it Fast! workshops, and they will be running between February 20 and March 8 to help all undergraduate and taught postgraduate students navigate the library landscape, which can at times seem filled with so much choice.

They are held over lunch time in The Sir Duncan Rice Library and are a great introduction to the services and resources we provide and the best ways in which you can make use of them. They cover:

  • Using Google cleverly to get you to the information you need more quickly.
  • Using the many online databases which we subscribe to. They contain important resources which you just cannot find by searching in Google!
  • How to search for the hundreds of thousands of electronic books which we have access to.

Invest one hour of your time over lunch to learn tips and techniques that will repay you with time saved when searching for the materials you need for assignments and exams!

To find out more and to view the full list of Find it Fast! workshops on offer please go to www.abdn.ac.uk/coursebooking and search for Library Information Skills courses.