Citation Pearl-Growing and WorldCat

Topic: teachers collaborating with school librarians to use technology in the classroom

Database: WorldCat

I found my pearl using WorldCat. I found the pearl by searching teachers AND librarians AND technology collaboration. Only four results appeared, and the fourth was the right one for my topic.

My pearl:

Harrison, Melissa R. 2005. "An examination of the instructional partner role of a media

specialist an action research study." Thesis (Ed. S.)--Valdosta State University,

2005.

A descriptor used to describe this book was educational technology. Media specialist was also in the title. In my next search, I used these terms as well as the following: teachers OR educators AND school librarians or media specialists AND technology or educational technology.
This search came back with 131 results. I chose the 15th result on the second page.

Conover, Patricia Ross. 2007. Technology projects for library media specialists and

teachers. Worthington, OH: Linworth Books.

Contents: Think outside the box and have fun while doing it! -- Publish and present -- Research and show what you know.


I chose this book because it is an instructional guide with projects that can be applied to the classroom. As I’ve said before, I like practical solutions and ideas for how to accomplish technology collaboration between teachers and librarians, and this book looks like it takes that approach. TWU’s library has this book available for use, and I hope to check it out and read it before I begin my career as a librarian.

Reflection: Chu says that the citation pearl-growing approach “implies search results will increase in quantity like making a snowball in the snow”(Chu 2007, 84). This definition makes me feel my search was a success. Since I only found four results when I originally stumbled across my pearl, and adding the descriptors upped my results to 131, I feel that I did make a snowball since I collected more information as the search continued. Personally, I prefer to weed out articles or books as I search, so this was a new concept for me. I can see why this is helpful. I would have never thought to use the term educational technology on my own, and I might not have found this book any other way. I’m going to try to incorporate citation pearl into my search methods in the future.

Chu, Heting. 2007. Information Representation and Retrieval in the Digital Age. New Jersey:

Information Today, Inc.