Library databases are structured collections of information, eg. full text journal articles, abstracts of books, book chapters and journal articles, statistics etc, which are available electronically via the Internet.
Education is a multidisciplinary subject so different databases will be relevant to different research needs.
If you want to search the contents of many different journals you'll need to use electronic databases. Databases usually contain summaries of articles (called abstracts), and many provide full text journal articles.
Finding the right Database
Depending on your topic a number of electronic databases available via the UTS Library website may be relevant to your search e.g.
- A+Education
[2]Indexing and full text database that covers all aspects of Australian education. A+ Education is based on 'AEI', the Australian Education Index.
A+ Education Tutorial [3] (Flash) (2:21 mins) (3.9mb)
- Academic Search Premier
[4]International scholarly full text database which covers general education, adult education and language and linguistics.
- Australian Family and Society Abstracts (FAMILY)
[5]Indexes and abstracts articles from published and unpublished material on research, policy and practice issues about, or of relevance to, Australian families. Link to full text through SFX or search the Library Catalogue for the item.
- ERIC
[6]The Educational Resource Information Center, contains more than 2,200 digests in full text along with references for additional information and citations and abstracts from over 1,000 educational and education-related journals. Link to full text journal articles through SFX or search the Library Catalogue for the item.
Tutorial [7]
- Newsbank
[8]Full text national, international, regional, and local news from across Australia and the world.
Tutorial [9]
- Professional Development Collection
[4]Highly specialized collection of electronic information especially for professional educators. Contains full text journal articles.
- Proquest Education Collection
[10]Full text database which combines three education-related databases: ABI/INFORM Global, Career and Technical Education and ProQuest Education Journals.
- Web of Science
[11]Scholarly multidisciplinary full text database which also provides cited reference searching.
- Wiley Interscience Collection
[12]Multidisciplinary full text database with a scientific emphasis.
There are two ways to access databases:
- If you know the name of a database search the Catalogue [13] under its name.
- To choose from a list of databases go to the Library's Databases [14] page and choose the subject category: Education
To access most databases you need your UTS Webmail User ID and Password [15] to identify yourself as a student or staff member.
Where's the full text?
If you can't find a Full Text link in a database look around for a link to SFX. When you click on the SFX link you activate software which searches through other UTS Library databases trying to locate the full text for you. If it finds the full text it gives you the name of another database and a GO button to click on. You may also be referred back to the Library Catalogue for the hardcopy on the shelves. If SFX can't find the full text in UTS Library you'll be referred to other university Library Catalogues, Google or InterLibrary Loan (for post graduates only).
If you can't find the SFX link search the Library Catalogue for the item.
For more information about accessing UTS Library's electronic resources see Online Access [16].