A veritable gold mine of more than 40 well-organized, well-presented issues briefs follows three remarkably clear, concise chapters on finding, evaluating, and incorporating Internet resources. Using experience gleaned from teaching students online to research the Web, the authors introduce topics such as browsing, narrowing, assessing needs, and selecting tools and terminology, e.g., Boolean and other symbologies.
They do an excellent job of taking readers through steps needed to evaluate each resource’s value for the project, and then to put it all together with helpful instructions for citations and plagiarism avoidance. Ninety percent of the book is devoted to issues briefs, organized alphabetically from abortion through world trade. Each one follows a consistent format beginning with a two-page summary and suggested sites for that topic. Sites are grouped into reference, news, law and legislation, data, and advocacy (pro and con). Appendixes include a listing of online opinion magazines, think tanks, and proprietary databases. This easy-to-use, easy-to-reference book is a godsend for those who are able to incorporate controversial issues into their research instruction. While sites, of course, are subject to change, most seem to have relative permanence so the book should retain relevance for
some time to come.–Mary R. Hofmann, Rivera Middle School, Merced, CA
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