The science teachers in TCIS assign lab reports as homework. They also assign research reports. Nowadays, you can get countless information easily with the internet. You just type the key word in the search engines and various amounts of information will pop up on the screen in a second. However, have you thought about a situation when this convenient internet is out of service or not available and when you have to handle your research report to science teacher until next class? You will feel blank and go crazy. I understand how desperate situation is; but fortunately, I have a solution for this problem, which is using information recorded on papers or film. Since you cannot waste the time on watching films, using an encyclopedia would be the best way. We need four steps to collect information with encyclopedia to save your precious time.
Searching an encyclopedia in a library is the first step. Libraries contain various amounts of information in books, and they have encyclopedia too. Encyclopedia is at the reference section in a library. In our school, we have reference book section with a stack of encyclopedia at the far-side right corner from the entrance in the high school library. If you cannot find, ask librarians where the encyclopedias are; they will answer your question with pleasure.
For the next step, choose one type of encyclopedia you will use and find an appendix of encyclopedia. An appendix acts like an index in the book. If you look on the appendix, you will see bold words, light words and numbers on the right side of both bold and light words. The numbers next to the bold words refer the page number of the article that is mainly about that bold word, and the numbers next to light words refer articles that contain related information to the bold word. After you find the appendix, search for your key word. Words are in alphabetical order, so you will not have trouble finding the key word.
Then find the book according to appendix, but do not grab any book. Let us assume that you were looking for ‘energy’ as a key word and it is on the page eighty-four according to the appendix, then you should grab the book labeled with ‘E’. You would waste your precious time if you looked on the book labeled with ‘A’. If you find the right book and page, check if the article contains information, you really need for the report. If it is not, you should look on other pages, which are next to the light words below your key words. Also, use different types of encyclopedia and do the same procedure you have just taken due to dissatisfaction with information. It will be helpful for the perfect report.
Before the last step, you have two choices; finish the report in the library or take information and work at home. If you decided to work at home, you have two methods to copy: use photocopier or write down on sheets of paper. Since the encyclopedia is the reference book, you cannot take it home, so you need to copy it. If you want to highlight or find out passages are too long to copy down, it would be better to use a photocopier. Usually, library has a photocopier for people who want to borrow reference books. We have one photocopier at the far side left corner from the entrance, and we need to pay for each copy. You can borrow it from friends or buy a card. Even you do not know how to use the photocopier, do not worry. Ask librarians for help and they will help you.
Now you took all the steps to search information for your research report. You found the appendix in a stack of encyclopedias in library and searched for a key word in appendix. Then you found the right book to find the right information and copied it. These easy four steps might not take more than ten minutes. I recommend you to use later when you face the desperate situation again. So, you are ready now and go to write your perfect report.
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