With the implementation of common core in full swing here at the high school where I teach, students are busy writing argumentative essays and citing evidence from the text to support their arguments. (ELA Reading Standard 1). As librarians, we are encouraging students to use our databases to search for articles to help them develop their claims. We subscribe to Libguides, a Spring Share product, to develop our web pages. These libguides direct students to the databases and assist them in finding credible websites. The article and database libguide directs students to government websites, databases and news websites. To encourage detailed note taking, our library has adopted a “Fact/Feel Journal” from Achieve 3000. This note taking device requires students to create a citation BEFORE they begin the note taking practice. The students then choose quotes and write their reactions in the column next to the quote they choose. Our fact/feel journal also requires a citation at the top of the page. Students get into the habit of properly citing their sources when they complete the citation box at the top of their note taking page before they start to cite the text. This is the first step for research for our students. Our English teachers will carry on from here and help our students write convincing arguments using the information the students researched.
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