English

1. Choose a topic.

For example, I am interested in technology and learning. So my research topics are technology and learning. 

2. Turn your topic into a research question. To help formulate your research question, ask yourself:

• What do you already know about the topic?   For instance, I already know that technology sometimes advances learning if used appropriately. However, it may hinder learning if used inappropriately. 
   
• What you do you want to know about the topic? For example, I want to know about the appropriate ways to use technology to advance learning, in particular for elementary school students. 

3. Choose keywords from your research question. Keywords are usually the main ideas or concepts in your research question.

For instance, the keywords from my research question are technology, learning, and elementary school. Starting off with broader terms will make searching easier. 

4. Find synonyms for your keywords. Synonyms give you more options for search terms.

Finding synonyms is a great search strategy and an effective way for you to get a comprehensive listing of articles on your topic.

My keywords are technology, education, teaching, learning, K-4, "elementary students," "elementary schools."  The last two have quotations marks around them to indicate that both words must be used together.

Keep in mind, authors use different words to describe the same concept, so you may not retrieve all of the relevant articles on your topic unless you type in the right search terms. It is beneficial to spend some time brainstorming keywords to build the most effective search strategy.

5. Now it is time to connect the keywords together using the Boolean Operators!

Boolean Operators are:   AND    OR     NOT

Use them to connect your search terms.

AND: gives you fewer results.  Use AND for different concepts to narrow your results.
Example: capital punishment AND Illinois
This search will find items about capital punishment, but only if the word "Illinois" is included.

OR: gives you more results.  Use OR for synonyms and related concepts to increase the number of results.
Example: capital punishment OR death penalty
This search will find items that have either the phrase "capital punishment" or "death penalty."

NOT: Use NOT when you want to eliminate irrelevant terms from your results.
Example: java NOT coffee
If you're searching for Java script, this search will not give you irrelevant items about coffee.

For example, here are the search strings I constructed:

technology AND education AND "elementary school" 

technologies AND teaching AND "elementary students"

technology AND learning AND K-4

Try to use AND to connect two or three concepts first. 

6. Start searching! Use your keywords and synonyms as search terms in databases and book catalogs.

      

     Need to see it in action?  View these videos below.

Combining search terms with AND

Move from a broad topic to a manageable research topic.

Keyword selection

This video will help you better understand the importance of keyword brainstorming.