ANZ Reference Centre

About the Database

The ANZ Reference Centre is a core database subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.

ANZ Reference Centre combines Australasian magazines, newspapers, newswires and reference books to create a collection of regional full text content available to libraries Australia and New Zealand.
This database includes Australian and New Zealand periodicals and international periodicals in full text; full text reference books; 84,774 full text biographies and an Image Collection of 235,186 photos, maps and flags.

It contain the following Victorian newspapers in full text
-The Age
-The Australian
-Herald Sun

Information Guides

The following tutorials have been provided by EBSCO. The first link will take you to an online tutorial on basic searching.

Searching Tutorial - click here (4 minutes)

If you are feeling more adventurous after looking at this tutorial perhaps you may like to remind yourself what "Visual Searching" is all about and how it works. Again the good folk at EBSCO have put together an online tutorial that will help. This one only runs for 2 minutes and 20 seconds so get yourself a cup of tea and shift your mind into training mode.

Visual Search Tutorial - click here (2 minutes 20 seconds)

For those of you who really want to be known as "Power Users" have a look at the tutorial on how to create search and journal alerts.

Search and Alerts Tutorial - click here (4 minutes)

EBSCO have released an upgrade to the look of the database. For more information go to the following demonstration.

EBSCOhost 2.0 user interface


Explore

The database can be found on the Databes page of the Yarra Plenty website under "General Reference" and also under "Newspapers" . Go to this link and explore the database

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#newspaper_databases

Questions to test you

See if you can find information or answers to the following questions:

1. Find a review of "That Memory Book" - who wrote the book and who wrote the review?

2. Recommend 2 articles on the use of Stem Cell Technology to make Insulin. Name the articles and their authors.

3. Find a recipe for Chocolate Mud Cake and Mandarin Ice Cream. Which copy of the Australian

Britannica Online

About the Database
Britannica Online is is one of the core databases subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.

Encyclopedia Britannica Online Library Edition, to give it the full title, offers encyclopedias at 3 different levels according to age group. It is possible to search across all 3 levels at the same time or to specify a search at one particular level.
-Encyclopedia Britannica is for adults.
-Britannica Student is for Upper Primary and Secondary School students.
-Britannica Junior is for Primary School students.

Completed searches will not only give you traditional written articles but links to other websites, relevant magazine articles and multimedia such as photographs and videos.


Information Guides

The following link will take you to a tutorial provided by Britannica.

Introduction Tutorial - click here (3 pages)

For a more in-depth look at searching and browsing go to the following help pages.

Advanced Tutorial - click here (7 pages)


Explore

Britannica Online is found on the Databases page of th eYarra Plenty website under "General Reference" - go to the following page explore it for yourself.

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#general_reference


Questions to test you

1. On what date did the Titanic crash into the iceberg?

2. What year did the last "Thilacine" die? Spot the deliberate spelling error. Check out the neat little box next to the Search Box in Britannica entitled " Unsure of the spelling" - click it and see what happens after entering "Thilacine".

3. How long is a Lacrosse field?

Oxford Art Online

About the Database

Oxford Art Online is is one of the databases subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.

Oxford Art Online is a visual arts encyclopedia comprised of "Grove Art Online" (online version of the 34 volumed "Grove Dictionary of Art"), "The Encyclopedia of Aesthetics", "The Oxford Companion to Western Art" and "The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms". It covers all aspects of Western and Non-Western visual art - from Aboriginal Australian Art through to Zygouries ( a Bronze Age settlement in Greece) and Architecture through to Zincograph. It has over 5000 images in the database and links through to all the great museums of the world.


Information Guides

The following link will take you through to a page where you can open a Powerpoint presentation provided by Oxford.

Grove Art Online Guided Tour

For a more in-depth look at searching and browsing go to the following help pages.

Tips for experienced Grove Art Online Users (8 pages)


Explore

Oxford Art Online is found on the Yarra Plenty database page under "Music and the Arts" - go to the following page to try it for yourself.

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#music


Questions to test you

1. Which art movement did Dante Gabriel Rossetti belong to? Find an image of his painting "Proserpine" - which gallery owns the painting?

2. What is "chiaroscuro"?

3. Van Rijn is his surname what is his first name and when was he born?

Science Resource Centre

About the Database

The reference content from Science Resource Centre comes from over 50 titles published in book form by Cengage (formerly Thomson Gale), such as the "Gale Encyclopedia of Science" and the "Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine", the "World of Biology/Chemistry/Physics" series and UXL encyclopedias. Other content includes 200 full text magazines, journals and newspapers, 500 weblinks and 8000 multimedia items.

It is ideal for school students - each article is marked with one of three symbols to denote basic, intermediate or advanced levels. They relate roughly to Upper Primary, Secondary, and Upper Secondary/Tertiary levels.

Information Guides

For a brief guided tour go to the following link.

Science Resource Center Guided Tour - (5 minutes)

For more help with advanced searching check out the search tips.

Science Resource Center Search Tips - (2 pages)

Explore

The Science Resource Centre is found on the Yarra Plenty webpage under "Science"
Go to the following link to explore it for yourself.

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#science

Don't forget to look at the "Timeline" link at the top of the page.

Questions to test you

1. Do a "person" search for a famous scientist. Find an entry with some useful information for a grade 6 assignment.

2. Find some information about the new status of Pluto in the solar system. What is the status and what article did you find it in?

3. Find an article in a magazine about genetic testing. List the article title, author, date and content level.

Oxford Music Online

About the Database

Oxford Music Online is is one of the databases subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.

Oxford Music Online is comprised of four resources the major one being Grove Music Online which is based on the "New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians" - it covers 5000 years of music, music history, instruments, composers, institutions, performers and genres in 29,000 articles and 20,000 biographies. But that's not all they have also included all of the "New Grove Dictionary of Opera" (over 1,800 operas) and the "New Grove Dictionary of Jazz".

Also included in the database are:
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music which has 29,000 entries covering popular music of all genres and periods from 1900 to the present day, including jazz, country, folk, rap, reggae, techno, musicals, and world music..... and yes it has a lot of Australian content. They update the EPM three times a year so it remains very current.
The Oxford Companion to Music which has more than 8,000 articles on composers, performers, conductors, individual works, instruments and notation, forms and genres.
The Oxford Dictionary of Music which has 12,500 entries on all things musical.

Each of these resources can be searched individually or you can search across all four.

Information Guides

Guided tours for both Grove Music Online and the Encyclopedia of Popular Music can be found here.

Oxford Music Online Guided Tours

Website

Oxford Music Online is found on the Yarra Plenty website at

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#music


Questions to test you

1. Where and when was the first performance of Richard Wagner's "Der Ring des Nibelungen"?

2. Where and when was John Farnham born?

3. What is a "Jembe" - what would you do with it and where?

Biography Resource Centre

About the database

The Biography Resource Center is one of the database subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.


The Biography Resource Center combines over 440,000 biographies on more than 340,000 people from over 1,000 volumes of more than 135 respected Gale sources such as "Contemporary Authors", "Encyclopedia of World Biography", "Newsmakers", "Contemporary Theatre, Film, and Television", "Contemporary Musicians", "Historic World Leaders", "Notable Twentieth-Century Scientists", "Contemporary Black Biography", "International Dictionary of Art and Artists", and "Writers Directory", with full-text articles from more than 325 magazines and newspapers including "American History", "The New York Times", and "USA Today". Yes that's a whole lot of information in that database and not all of it is USA-centric - there are 2213 entries on famous and infamous Australians ranging from AC/DC to Fay Zwicky.

You can perform keyword searches or conduct a search across a variety of "Biographical Facts" such as Nationality, Occupation and Gender.


Information guides

A guided tour of the Biography Resource Center can be found at the following address, takes a while to load.

Biography Resource Center Recorded Webcast - (10 minutes)

For more in depth material check out the Biography Resource Center Navigation Guide.

Biography Resource Center Navigation Guide - (15 pages)


Website

Biography Resource Center is found on the Yarra Plenty website at

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#biography

Questions

1. How many Australian Librarians are listed in the Biography Resource Center?

2. What was Hugh Jackman's nickname at school? (Hint - read through the "Biographical Essay" on Jackman)

3. Which football team does the English author Nick Hornby follow?

Ancient and Medieval History Online / Modern World History Online

About the database

Ancient and Medieval History Online and Modern World History Online are subscribed to through the Gulliver consortium.

Ancient and Medieval History Online provides coverage of eight ancient and medieval civilisations - Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome, Africa, Asia, the Americas and medieval Europe.

Modern World History Online covers world history from the mid-15th century through to the present.
Thousands of fully hyperlinked subject entries, biographies, images and videos, maps and charts, primary sources, and timeline entries combine to provide a detailed and comparative view of the people, places, events, and ideas that have defined ancient and modern world history. One of the most useful features are the Learning Centers which bring together several relevant entries that allow users to find a starting point for their research.

The databases can be searched individually or together through a federated search. Click on the phrase "Additional Facts on File Databases" and then "History Database Search".
They are both incredibly easy to search and extremely comprehensive in their scope.

Information Resources

Information sheets on the databases can be found here:

Ancient and Medieval History Online

Modern World History Online


Explore the databases
Ancient and Medieval History Online and Modern World History Online are found under "History" on the Online Databases link on theYarra Plenty webpage

http://www.yprl.vic.gov.au/computers/databases.html#history

Don't forget to explore the timelines link on each database.

Questions to test you

Ancient and Medieval History Online

1. Who was the wife of the Pharaoh Akhenaten?

2. When was the Magna Carta signed by King John?

3. Which Pope was responsible for beginning the First Crusade?

Modern World History Online

1. What was the name of Arthur Phillip's flagship in the First Fleet?

2. What is Mahatma Gandhi's full name?

3. Who was the original commander of the ANZACs in WW I?