RESEARCH
EDUCATION
IN
PROFESSOR SARAH COHN
HEAD OF REFERENCE, EDUCATION LIBRARIAN
November 25, 2025
AGENDA
Getting Help
Framing Our Practice
Source Types
Searching
Library Databases
TODAY'S
Getting Help
Professor Sarah Cohn
Head of Reference, Education Librarian
scohn@ccny.cuny.edu
Reference Desk: Cohen Library
Monday-Thursday 10am-7pm
Friday 10am-4pm
PRACTICE
FRAMING OUR
Research as Inquiry
Research is iterative and depends upon asking increasingly complex or new questions whose answers in turn develop additional questions or lines of inquiry.
Searching as Strategic Exploration
Searching for information is often nonlinear and iterative, requiring the evaluation of a range of information or sources, and the flexibility to pursue alternate avenues as new understanding develops.
LLMs & Generative AI
On the matter of unicorns
TYPES
SOURCE
Scholarly AKA Peer Reviewed AKA Academic
An empirical research article reports the results of a study that uses data derived from actual observation or experimentation.
- Introduction
- Method
- Results
- Discussion
Not all articles published in a scholarly journal are peer reviewed.
Not all peer reviewed articles are empirical.
STRATEGIES
SEARCH
Full Sentence Searches
What evidence is there about learning styles?
Are learning styles a myth or a reality?
use AND to connect terms
combining different terms = different results
learning styles AND myth AND evidence
visual learners AND reading AND evidence
use "..." for phrases or names
"learning styles", "bell hooks"
use database filters to narrow your search
you may need to broaden your search
DATABASES
LIBRARY
Education Source
ERIC
Educators Reference Complete
OneSearch
Taylor & Francis Academic OneFile
JSTOR
Subject Specific
Multi-Disciplinary
library.ccny.cuny.edu
OneSearch box
Databases link
- Access to all 200+ databases at CCNY
- Alphabetical or filter by subject
- Simple search bar option
- Meta-search
- Searches multiple databases at once
- Catalog of print & ebooks
but not all of them!
SOURCE
EDUCATION
Filters: Peer Reviewed
OPTIONAL!!!
Search Options: Find all my search terms
Getting Help
Professor Sarah Cohn
Head of Reference, Education Librarian
scohn@ccny.cuny.edu
Reference Desk: Cohen Library
Monday-Thursday 10am-7pm
Friday 10am-4pm