Research Will Never be the Same: Thank You RSS

As a second year English teacher and Graduate student, I am actively involved in research. For today's modern student. This usually means logging onto their school's online library where a database is found. Within this database, a number of archives can be found where scholarly journals and peer reviewed articles are found. However, a great deal of hunting and pecking then takes place in this time consuming educational practice. The crazy thing, is every time a paper needs to be written, this process begins anew. It needn't be so.

Friends and readers, RSS (really simple syndication) is here. I am sure many of you probably do not even know what this is, although undoubtedly you have seen the emblem, on this very blog. I have included two videos that will help, first an explanation of what RSS is, and second a look at Google Reader. If RSS is a web 2.0 tool, Reader is one of the programs or applications you use to access it. Think of it like this, email is to Hotmail as RSS is to Google Reader.

RSS VIDEO

GOOGLE READER

I explained it to my Senior Literature class when I was student teaching as this: Think of it as owning your own newspaper, you are William Randolph Hearst in the information age. You can not only include the sections you want, but you can tell what stories your reporters are to look for. Then, you kick back, put your feet up and wait for the stories, the ones you want to hear, are found and delivered to you.

I love google news for this. Where as many websites have an rss link, with Google news, you can specify what information gets relayed to you when a new story comes out. Well, many databases are now not only offering RSS, they are as customizable as Google News. For example, if I log onto to a supporting database, or even Google News, I can specify what I want it to look for, 'blogging classrooms' let's say. Then, any story or article that comes through that has anything to do with classrooms that are using blogs, gets saved and sent to my Google Reader account.

I realize this is all a bit much. My advice, watch the videos, then proceed to this website and watch the tutorial. Then, sign up and start subscribing to feeds. Depending on what website you are on, subscribing may vary. Usually, you simply right click on the RSS symbol, select copy shortcut and then log onto your Reader, click 'add subscription' and then paste the shortcut. Other times you may simply left click on the emblem, and then copy and paste the URL of the page that opens into the Reader subscription box. I swear its worth it. When you find yourself with time on your hands, you know, instead of hunting and searching through databases, you can whittle a likeness of me, situate it in a place of honor.