Grolier Online
Grolier Online is actually a suite of six products. The print Grolier Encyclopedias have been staples of school
libraries for many decades and the online versions of these products are
excellent reference tools. Three are encyclopedias, each with something a
little different that makes it a good product depending on a student’s learning
style and abilities.
Encyclopedia Americana provides in-depth information for older students
and adults. When you enter the home page for Encyclopedia Americana, you’ll see
a yellow band across the top where you can enter your search term, just as if
you were walking up to a multi-volume print set and picking the correct letter
off the shelf. Of course, when you took that volume off the shelf, you found a
single entry for that topic and then some “see also” references that directed you
to other volumes you might find information in. With the online version, you
get a prioritized list and all of the “see also” references are hot-liked to
enable you to click and go to that section. Is it any wonder our children want
to use electronic resources for their research? Here is what our generation
needs to remember. It is still an encyclopedia. So, when a teacher says you can
only use one Internet resource, does the electronic encyclopedia we subscribe
to count as that one Internet resource? I don’t think so. To librarians, it
counts as an encyclopedia.
If you don’t want to enter a search topic in the yellow bar, you can also
browse by subject category, explore biographies, access journals and
newspapers, or you might select Editors' Picks, a guide to topics and web sites
the editors have found of special interest that week. These topics are
archived, so they are always available.
The second encyclopedia in the suite is Grolier’s Multimedia Encyclopedia,
a quick reference general encyclopedia that is rich in multimedia formats.
While this in not a good choice to use if you access the internet with dial-up
access, it is a great resource for reaching students of all ages who may need
to receive their information in multiple formats instead of just print. I love
multimedia (audio, video, animation) because it can often explain a difficult
concept in an easily understood way. Please note that the link to the
Multimedia Encyclopedia does provide a text only button, for those doing
dial-up. Of course, then you don’t have the multimedia!
Once you enter the Multimedia Encyclopedia, you’ll see that familiar yellow
band and search box at the top for you to enter your topic. Or you can choose
from the side menu: Browse articles, Research Starters, Timelines, News, Brain
Jam (similar to Editor’s Picks in that they are archived features on a topic),
Current Events (In the News), or Today is…which, of course, looks at today in
history. You’ll even see a section of quizzes and games. Those are educational
games, you know.
The third encyclopedia is the New Book of Knowledge (NBK.) The reading
level in this encyclopedia is appropriate for elementary students and higher.
Articles will be shorter and not quite as in-depth. Again you’ll see that
familiar yellow band and search box at the top. With all of these sources, you
can search the individual resource for your topic, or you can choose for it to
search for your topic in all of Grolier Online.
You’ll find the usual links down the side of the page plus some additional
features, such as Projects and Experiments or Web Feat. Grolier didn’t just
have the elementary student in mind when they designed this product; they also
had parents in mind! It is so nice to have science experiments and quality web
sites pre-selected for our use.
Speaking of science, The New Book of Popular Science is the fourth
product in the suite. Perfect from upper elementary on, students will find
great biographies of scientists, current science news, science projects and
challenges, and so much more. The beauty of this resource, as with the others,
is the current nature of the product. In the library, once we buy a print
resource, it is often years before we can update it. But with these online
products, they are updated several times a year. That makes the New Book of
Popular Science a great resource for the latest science news.
The fifth resource in the suite is Lands and Peoples, an encyclopedia of
countries, cultures and current events designed for middle school and older
students. Right away, you’ll notice the yellow band and search box at the top
of the home page. Down the middle are links to the Global News Desk, an
electronic atlas and almanac, an encyclopedia that is topically arranged by
continent, and Culture Cross where students can compare countries and
continents. Students will also find Passport to Fun where they can test their
knowledge of countries in fun games and quizzes.
The last resource in the suite is America the Beautiful. This is one of
our most widely used online resources, especially at the elementary level. The
home page features a large interactive map of the United States. Above the map
on the home page are five red bars offering special features: U.S. Topics,
Timelines, Profiles, Games, and Almanac. You’ll find the familiar yellow band
and search box at the very top of the page. Students have access to well
organized state information, including fast facts, history, geography, economy,
culture, government, cities, spotlights, profiles, state timelines and some games
or activities. America the Beautiful also contains multimedia clips related to
the states.
Looking at the entire suite, I’d like to encourage you to look for the help
buttons because they really do help us understand how to use the resource and
just what we can expect to find in that particular resource. You’ll notice that
all of the resources have printing and e-mailing options. The help feature also
offers advice to improve our searches. Our librarians believe strongly that
students need to learn to search effectively. We start with library lessons on
searching at a very young age.
If you have questions about accessing the Grolier Suite of online products or
any of our wonderful electronic resources, please don’t hesitate to contact
your school librarian. Remember:
Knowledge is Power!
Remember:
You will need to see your building
librarian to get the usernames and passwords so that you can use this resource from your home computer!