Ohio Standards Connections: Grade 6-8 Scientific Inquiry Ohio Standards Connections: Library guideline 5: Information Literacy School library media specialist teaches students how to access, use and evaluate information resources efficiently and ethically based on academic or personal need. School library media programs provide information resources in a variety of formats and readability levels.

Lesson Summary: Students will learn how the library is organized. They will learn where to find books that might be useful to select their science fair are of inquiry. The students will then use this knowledge to select books on their Science Fair topic. Estimated Duration: One to two class periods. Additional time will be needed for remediation. Commentary: Title of the lesson is: Library organization for the Junior High Science Fair Project. Pre-Assessment: The student will be given a short oral questioning to determine prior knowledge of the library, its contents and organization. Scoring Guidelines: The student will self score and determine their level of competence. Post-Assessment: The student will choose books that correlate with their Science Fair project. Scoring Guidelines: Checklist Instructional Procedures: A brief tour of the library and a discussion of the organization of our school library will be given. I will touch on the Dewey Decimal System as a means of creating and maintaining order in the library shelving. I will mention how books in a library are shelved ‘left to right’ and ‘top to bottom’. An awareness of the Library of Congress Classification System will be touched upon, should the students use a public library implementing that system. Areas, in the library, which contain books relevant to their scientific research, will be stressed, as well as using elementary level books to give the student a firm and clear base upon which to build new knowledge. Encyclopedias, journals and magazines (Print media) will be presented and explained. Differentiated Instructional Support The pre-assessment questioning will give an idea of where the students are in their library knowledge. After the initial assessment, those students who grasp the areas of the library will start picking out their books. We will then discuss the difference between quality and quantity in reference materials. For remediation, one of us will repeat the information. Some students may need assistance with selection of books that match their topic. Homework Options and Home Connections The opportunity to use the public library and its resources. Interdisciplinary Connections The research skills integrate into all other content areas. Materials and Resources: For teachers List of Pre-Assessment vocabulary. For students None Key Vocabulary Collection. Journals. Reference Sources. Classification. Databases. Fiction. Non-Fiction. Biography. Magazines. Print resources. Technology Connections Discuss how the public libraries have different on-line catalogs. Students will be at different levels, depending on their past use of these facilities. Research Connections Students will be able to navigate through the stacks of our school library and also, through the lesson’s rudimentary knowledge of the library classification systems, have a general idea of the layout of a public library. General Tips Make sure that you have the attention of all students, preferably having students that need remediation near the instructors. Record observations and suggested modifications to facilitate instruction and student learning in the lesson. Attachments Pre-assessment concepts and vocabulary list for informal review.