1. Brainstorm! Get organized and take time to think about information what you are looking for. Do you need current or historical information or statistical data? Do you need books? Articles? Do your sources have to be peer reviewed?
2. Break your topic down into keywords or concepts. Think about possible synonyms for those words and phrases. Each database you search uses its own group of search terms, or has a thesaurus of specific keywords that can help you get the best results.
3. If you don't know what to search for, start with a broad topic and narrow as you go; use filters like a date range.
4. Once you've done a search scan the results to see what kind of articles you retrieved. Read the abstract of the article first. If you see a good article look for additional keywords or even subject headings which have been attached to the article and try those in your search.
5. Be flexible -- you may need to broaden or narrow your search depending on the amount and kind of information you find. You may also need to change your topic if you can't locate enough information.
Sample Research Topic: "Application of mainstreaming in the United State and its relationship to special education law"
1. Identify keywords or phrases: mainstreaming special education law
2. Explore synonyms for your keywords/phrases
mainstreaming
special education law
3. Use these terms in your search. Combine the synonyms with the word "OR"
For example:
Research Tip - Use truncation to expand your search results
Example: instead of using "mainstream" as a search term, add an asterisk to the end of the word and it will add on all possible endings to the root word
Mainstream* - would bring up mainstream, mainstreaming, mainstreamed
What a search would look like in an EBSCO Database Advanced Search
