In week 3 Bodleian Libraries are running the following information skills sessions:

Bodleian iSkills: Finding stuff – scholarly literature for your research (Monday 1st February 14.00-17.00; repeated Wednesday 10th February 9.15-12.15) Weeks 3 & 4
A practical introduction to searching for scholarly materials to support your research, covering a range of tools for finding monographs, journal articles, conference papers, theses and more.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers and academics.
Presenters: Joanne Edwards, Kate Beeby, Angela Carritt, Helen Worrell
Venue: IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Bodleian iSkills: Getting started in Oxford libraries (Tuesday 2nd February 10.00-12.00; repeated Wednesday 2nd March 9.30-11.30) Weeks 3 & 7
An introduction to Oxford Libraries including guidance on which libraries to use; accessing e-journals and other online resources; SOLO and other finding aids and making the most of Library services.
Who is this session for? Anyone who would like an introduction to Oxford Libraries.
Presenters: Angela Carritt & Cathy Scutt.
Venue: IT Services 13 Banbury Road

Bodleian iSkills: Managing Social Science Research (Tuesday 2nd February 14.00-16.00) Week 3
Good research data management is a vital component of academic practice. Part of this is the principle that the data used to develop the arguments and outcomes of your research should where possible be effectively stored, preserved and usable. This session introduces the University’s research data policy and outlines the practical impact this will have on the work of researchers. Some of the tools in preparation to meet the requirements will be outlined as well as services that are already available. Main subjects will include: Common dangers and pitfalls of digital data; Effective organisation of your data; Getting the most from your data and producing a data management plan; Data creation and funder requirements; Preserving data, embargoes and access restrictions; Oxford based tools for research data management (RDM). This session is not only essential during your DPhil but will be invaluable if you plan to continue in the field of research as a career.
Who is this session for? All DPhil Students and Research Staff in the Social Sciences
Presenter: John Southall
Venue: IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Bodleian iSkills: Your thesis, copyright & ORA (Wednesday 3rd February 14.00-15.00) Week 3
Oxford DPhil students are required to deposit a copy of their thesis in ORA (Oxford University Research Archive). This session will focus on copyright and other issues that DPhil students need to take into account when preparing their thesis for upload to ORA.
Who is this session for? All DPhil Students and Research Staff
Presenters: David Watson, Jason Partridge and Sarah Barkla
Venue: Radcliffe Science Library, Parks Road

What’s coming up in the iSkills Programme – See the full timetable at http://libguides.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/workshops/workshopsbydate

Keeping up with Bodleian Libraries training opportunities: Why not follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/bodleianskills   or visit the Bodleian iSkills blog at http://blogs.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/skills/

Questions? – Please contact usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk

In weeks 1&2 Bodleian Libraries are running the following iSkills Workshops on Open Access, Referencing and Reference Management Software. To book, click on the titles:

Bodleian iSkills: Open Access Oxford – what’s happening? (Thursday 21st January 11.00-12.00; repeated Thursday 18th February 14.00-15.00; Tuesday 1st March 11.00-12.00) Weeks 1, 5 & 7
A briefing on open access publishing and Oxford’s position: Green vs. Gold; funder mandates and publisher policies; Oxford Research Archive (ORA) and Symplectic; OA website/ helpline; what’s new.
Who is this session for? Research support staff, administrators and librarians, researchers and academics.
Presenter: Juliet Ralph
Venue: Radcliffe Science Library

Referencing: RefWorks for Humanities (Wednesday 27th January 9.15-12.15) Week 2
RefWorks is an online tool which allows you to manage your citations/references, insert them into your work as footnotes or intext citations, automatically generate bibliographies and easily switch between citation styles. This introduction is open to all, but the section on importing references will focus on Humanities examples.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers.
Presenters: Bethan Jenkins, Helen Matthews, Angela Carritt
Venue: IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Referencing: Refworks for Sciences and Social Sciences (Wednesday 27th January 9.15-12.15) Week 2
RefWorks is an online tool which allows you to manage your references, insert them into your work, automatically generate bibliographies and easily switch between citation styles. This introduction is open to all but the section on importing references will focus on Science/Social Science examples.
Presenters: Nia Roberts, Gigi Horsfield, Angela Carritt
Venue: IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Referencing: Choosing and using software (Thursday 28th January 9.15-12.15; repeated Friday 19th February 9.15-12.15) Weeks 2 & 5
Formatting your in text citations/footnotes and bibliography correctly for your thesis or publication is a chore. Reference management software makes it easier and saves you time. This introductory session gives an overview of how reference management works, explores the pros and cons of a wide range of reference management packages and gives you the opportunity to try out five different packages so that you can work out which one is best for you. The packages included are RefWorks, EndNote, Zotero, Mendeley, ColWiz and Papers.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers.
Presenters: Oliver Bridle, Erika Delbeque, Sophie Staves, Pamela Stanworth, Angela Carritt
Venue: IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Bodleian iSkills: Moving from research question to literature review in the Social Sciences (Thursday 28th January 14.00-16.00) Week 2
This 2 hour workshop will be invaluable for researchers hoping to find suitable literature for their literature review, for which a well constructed set of search terms and an understanding of online search engines are prerequisites. This workshop will allow researchers to use their own research questions to build a search and apply it to a range of databases. Techniques for structuring a search will be explained, an overview of key online resources for the social sciences will be given , major search tools will be explored, and strategies for approaching large results sets and sourcing papers will be discussed. This practical workshop will involve paper exercises and online activities using attendees own research topics.
Who is this session for? All DPhil Students and Research Staff in the Social Sciences
Presenter: John Southall
Venue: Social Sciences Library, Manor Road

We now have trial access to Readex’s African American Newspapers series I and II until 19th February.

This resource covers 1827-1998, and provides online access to approximately 330 U.S. newspapers chronicling a century and a half of the African American experience. The collections include historically significant papers from more than 35 states, and many rare 19th-century titles.

We trialled series I in July 2013. Series II, which has just been released, adds a further 75 titles to the first collection.

Access is available via OxLIP+ until 19th February 2016 (University members can use single sign-on for remote access).

Please send feedback about the trial to jane.rawson@bodleian.ox.ac.uk

As of today the library reverts to term time hours: Monday-Friday 9am-7pm and Saturday 10am-4pm.

A selection of the new books received in the library during December may now be seen on our website and LibraryThing page.