Library and Information Resources for Distance Learners on Education Courses

Introduction

Welcome to The Sir Duncan Rice Library and its Distance Service for students in the School of Education. It is important to remember that, although you are studying at a distance from the University, the full range of library services are available to you.

These services include traditional library borrowing, e.g. books, journals etc., as well as access to an outstanding collection of electronic resources such as books, academic journals and abstract databases to enable you to read and research for your course. We post items out to you free of charge where they are not available via the web, though you pay to return them to us.

Full details of the resources you can access are available in the Library Materials or Library Resources section of your course in MyAberdeen, your virtual learning environment at https://abdn.blackboard.com/ . The image below gives you an indication of what your course area may look like:

If you cannot find the library section within your course area please contact the Librarian, Claire Molloy via email (c.a.l.molloy@abdn.ac.uk ), so she can fix it!

Joining the Library

You need to be a fully e-registered student to borrow from the Library and use the other resources. Your course secretary will have sent you details about registration and it is important you follow these.

Contacting us and borrowing

As soon as you are fully registered you should log into MyAberdeen and check out any course related information. You can then look at all the guides about the various library and information resources available to you such as our e-books, scholarly articles and other useful information. This guide is just a very brief quick guide to the service so please check out everything in MyAberdeen!

If you want to borrow items simply email the HILDA (Help with Information Library and Distance Access) Team, library@abdn.ac.uk using your student email account (https://outlook.com/abdn.ac.uk). You should list the items you would like to borrow, with authors and titles if possible (!). We will then locate the items and, if they are available, post them out to you free of charge.

If they are not available we will let you know and ask if you would like them 'recalled' for you. This is where we ask the current borrower to return the item early (something that may also happen to you!). Recall emails are sent to your Student Email and it is important you check this a couple of times a week at the very least to keep an eye on it as late returns of items mean fines! You pay for return postage of any items borrowed and we recommend that you get some sort of proof of postage and if you are returning from overseas we ask that, as we use airmail to get the item to you, you use the same to get the item back to us:

Distance Learning Team (Floor 6)
The Sir Duncan Rice Library
University of Aberdeen
Bedford Road
Aberdeen
AB24 3AA

Again, full details of how many items you can borrow, loan periods and so on are in the Library Materials part of your MyAberdeen course.

Visiting the Library in person

The physical library is open 7 days a week and our opening hours differ during Term and Vacation time and, of course, we are usually closed around Christmas and New Year ( full details can be found on our Library website opening hours page ). Although you can visit the Library without one, in order to borrow in person, you will have to wait until you receive your ID card*. Most of the Education and Social Work books can be found on Floor 6 but some useful material may be classed as Psychology such as some Counselling items and are on Floor 7.

If you need help locating anything please ask either the Distance Team, who are based, Monday to Friday until 5pm, on Floor 6, or after 5pm and at weekends approach staff at the Welcome Desk on the way into the building stating you are an Education distance learner. Alternatively, Claire, your Information Consultant, (our fancy term for Librarian!) is based on Floor 6, and you can email her (c.a.l.molloy@abdn.ac.uk ) for an appointment.

*Note: If you upload a photo of yourself, when you receive your ID card, you will not only gain access to The Sir Duncan Rice Library and Sports Village here at Old Aberdeen but you can also get student discounts at cinemas, restaurants and shops!

Access to your local university library

Many universities now take part in a scheme called SCONUL Access which allows you as a student to borrow from a university library near you. You need to be fully e-registered with us and have received your ID card then go to www.sconul.ac.uk/sconul-access and complete the online forms. We then send you an email that you should take to your local university library along with your Aberdeen ID card.

Finding reading materials

There are so many different information resources available to you as a student of the School of Education at Aberdeen such as:

Primo: our information portal https://abdn.primo.exlibrisgroup.com
Google Scholar: a nice, easy way to find scholarly literature https://scholar.google.com/

There are many, many more and full details of how to use the above and other resources are in the Library Materials/Resources section of your course in MyAberdeen.

Any questions?

Do not forget, we are here to help you get the most out of the information resources available to you, so if you require any help at all with finding information for your assignment, please do not hesitate to contact Claire Molloy Information Consultant for Education, Music and Social Science E-mail: c.a.l.molloy@abdn.ac.uk

Last revised by Claire Molloy, August 2023