background-knowledge

=Become familiar with the ideas, major concepts, and basic vocabulary of your topic before you begin the research. = =Narrow your topic to a manageable subtopic. =

**Where to Locate Background Knowledge** Encyclopedias provide you with basic vocabulary of your subject including persons, places, and things. Encyclopedias often identify narrower areas within the broad subject, which may suggest a focus for your research. Encyclopedia articles often provide a list of references that can help you locate further, more in-depth and scholarly information sources.
 * **Encyclopedias are a good place to get an overview of a topic that is new to you or to refresh your knowledge**
 * [|World Book]
 * [|Wikipedia] See ASW Policy on Use of Wikipedia here.

If a general encyclopedia doesn't provide enough background information, search subject encyclopedias.
 * **Work from general to specific**
 * [|Ancient and Medieval History]
 * [|Teen Health and Wellness]
 * [|Modern World History]
 * [|Points of View]
 * Not an encyclopedia but provides concise overview on selected topics.
 * [|Science in Context]

[|Global Issues in Context]
 * Analysis of issues - social, political, military, economic, environmental, science related, health related, cultural
 * Focuses on broad issues, such as war, genocide, terrorism, human rights, poverty, famine, globalization, world trade, nuclear proliferation, and global warming, as well as more specific events and topics in the news that are related to these broader issues.
 * Detailed information on nations to provide a foundation for cross-cultural studies
 * Overviews summarizing background information, historical context, and contemporary stances
 * Expert perspectives analyzing an issue or event through multiple aspects
 * Reference documents providing background information on all issues and nations
 * Full-text international magazines, academic journals, news source, and primary sources
 * Statistics, including interactive graphs, tables, and charts


 * **As you gain more background information write down __//keywords//__ or key __//phrases//__.**

Keywords & phrases are the most important word or words about your topic and can be a person, place, or thing. //Visuwords// is an visual tool to find new words and improve your vocabulary. When you use Visuwords to look up a word it shows a graph which connects that word to other words based on different relationships between them. You can hover over each word to get its definition and also zoom-in and zoom-out using the mouse wheel.
 * **Enter the key word(s) at [|Visuwords]" to "find their meanings and associations with other words and concepts."**
 * **Use the key words you located to search library catalog and databases.**