ERIC Online: Tips

	About ERIC | ERIC Wizard | ERIC FirstSearch | Other ERIC Resources | Education Index |

About ERIC

Dates covered: 1966 to present, updated monthly, updated monthly

The ERIC (Educational Resources in Education) database contains annotated references to journal articles issued in the monthly Current Index to Journals in Education (CIJE) and non-journal material issued in the monthly Resources in Education (RIE). A database that indexes and abstracts 750 journal titles (EJ) and thousands of reports and documents (ED) in education. Every record is assigned subject headings, using the ERIC Thesaurus. The CSUN library owns the ED reports on microfiche as well as owning many of the journal titles.  Articles we do NOT own can be requested by CSUN faculty, students and staff through the Interlibrary Loan services on the Eric on FirstSearch1database. ERIC is supported by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and Improvement and is administered by the National Library of Education (NLE).

There are three primary types of ERIC publications:

• Journal articles ("EJ", NO full text)
• Documents ("ED", SOME full-text) - CSUN offers full-text access to latest five years
• Digests ("ED", ALL full text)

Among the subjects indexed in ERIC: Adult, career, and vocational education, information and technology, assessment and evaluation, language and linguistics, disabilities and gifted education, reading and communication, educational management, teacher and teacher education, elementary and early childhood education, urban education, higher education, and more.

Eric Journals

The CSUN library owns many of the journal titles (online or in print) indexed in the ERIC database. To determine if the library has the particular journal title and year you are looking for, conduct a Periodicals and Serials search via the online catalog.

Eric Documents

..... are NOT journal articles, but include:

Curriculum guides & lesson plans guides, research reports, bibliographies, issue papers, instructional materials, and test evaluation instruments.

Document records contain:

• ERIC ID Number (ED number)
• Publication Date
• Number of records: over 430,000
• CSUN Library owns all ERIC documents on microfiche from 1966 to present
• CSUN provides online full-text access [when available] to the most recent five years. To determine whether the ERIC document (ED) you are searching for is available in full text online, follow the instructions located on the library's "About ERIC" page

Eric Digests

...... are NOT journal articles, but are:

• Short reports (1,000 - 1,500 words) on topics of prime current interest in education
• Targeted specifically for teachers, administrators, policymakers, and other practitioners but are generally useful to the broad educational community
• Designed to provide an overview of information on a given topic, plus references to items providing more detailed information
• Reviewed by experts and content specialists in the field

Digest records contain:

• ERIC ID Number (ED number)
• Publication Date (easy to overlook; appears immediately before the title sometimes the month is shown, but often just a two-digit year appears)
• Number of records: over 2,400
• ERIC Digests are always available in full text

The CSUN library offers online ERIC access via two separate database versions:

• ERIC on FirstSearch1 -- offers Library holdings and direct access to an Interlibrary Loan request form.
• ERIC Wizard -- an online version of the ERIC thesaurus which allows you to enter your own search terms as well as informing you of the formal indexing terms available in the database itself

Access to ERIC    ERIC on FirstSearch 1       ERIC Wizard   

Other Eric Services on the World Wide Web

Alphabetical List of AskEric infoGuides

Points educators and others to Internet, ERIC, and traditional print resources dealing with specific educational topics chosen from frequently asked questions received by AskERIC's Question and Answer Service.

AskERIC-public WWW access

ERIC/Assessment Evaluation Test Locator

Eric Wizard Slide Show

ERIC Wizard

• Free Service, available to use to anyone who has Web Access
• An online version of the ERIC thesaurus.
• Allows natural language as well as thesaurus term searching.
• Easy to launch a search through the thesaurus but does NOT link to CSUN holdings
• Save tagged abstracts to disk
• Find similar to refine search

ERIC FirstSearch

• Subscription database, access restricted to CSUN students, faculty and staff
• An online version provides access to the ERIC thesaurus.
• Allows keyword as well as thesaurus term searching.
• Provides links to CSUN holdings. In the brief result list the symbol is a good indication CSUN may own the journal. When viewing the entire abstract for the journal article, you can access the CSUN online catalog and find out the journal's call number or url by clicking on the link "Search the catalog at California State University, Northridge."
• Save tagged abstracts to disk. print or email them

Education Index: Located in FirstSearch2, EducationIndex is an online version of the Education Index and covers topics in education. Print version: REF ROOM Z5813 .E23 Not currently received. 1929/32-1998.

Subjects:

Athletics, physical education, classroom computers, prayer in public schools, comparative education, psychology, educational technology, religious, education, government funding, science and mathematics, language and linguistics, special education, literacy, teacher evaluation, multicultural/ethnic education, and vocational education.

Sources indexed:

information from over 550 sources, entries after 1993 include abstracts
Number of records: Over 449,000
Dates covered: 1983 to present, updated monthly

Access to EducationIndex