Enclosed is this month's free newsletter for SIRS Knowledge Source® subscribers. This newsletter is designed to help teachers, librarians, and administrators stay informed about the latest changes to their SIRS subscription(s), while providing classroom resources and giving tips for using their ProQuest solutions in a variety of settings.
Our product development team is constantly reviewing customer feedback and making changes to our learning resources to meet your needs. Several updates to our SIRS family of products were recently completed and we wanted to bring them to your attention.
That’s Debatable Polls: Powering Student Debate & Research
One of the most popular features available in SIRS Researcher is our That’s Debatable Poll.
Students access Researcher, and are immediately confronted with a relevant, timely question in the upper right-hand corner that inspires thoughtful debate, deeper research, and spurs usage of your ProQuest and SIRS digital learning solutions. Every pro, con, or in-between view on the issues presented are covered via links to educator-vetted articles and SIRS resources.
How powerful are the results of this feature? See for yourself! Here are results from several recent That’s Debatable Polls for your consideration.
Does immigrant labor put a strain on our economy?
Yes: 51% | 48,096 Votes
No: 49% | 46,016 Votes
Total: 94,112 Votes
Should same-sex marriage be legalized?
Yes: 50% | 169,528 Votes
No: 50 % | 171,838 Votes
Total: 341,366 votes
Do non-nuclear countries have a right to develop nuclear weapons programs?
Yes: 39% | 30,186 Votes
No: 61% | 46,309 votes
Total: 76,495 votes
How can the conflict in the Middle East be resolved?
By military means: 60% | 808 Votes
By diplomatic means: 11% | 149 Votes
A combination of the two: 24% | 319 Votes
Unsure/other: 5% | 61 Votes
Total: 1,337 Votes
Don’t Miss a Single Teachable Moment: Free Curriculum & Lesson Plans
On the first of each month, our curriculum specialists deliver a powerful tool to thousands of K-12 teachers worldwide. And best of all, you can sign up to get this free, hands-on and classroom-ready content today at ProQuest.
Our monthly Teachable Moments email newsletter (November issue here) offers a treasure trove of innovative student activities that take full advantage of our complete line of K-12 learning solutions. Most can be easily augmented to fit into any classroom curriculum.
Sign up for Teachable Moments today using the box below, then browse our inventory of back issues. Consider it your own personal teachable moment with a professional development theme!
New ProQuest K-12 Catalog Available
Don’t miss the latest information about ProQuest’s full line of popular K-12 learning solutions. From eLibrary to SIRS to CultureGrams and beyond, you’re sure to find a new solution that will help students at all grade levels learn at their own pace--online. Get your copy of the PDF version today.
Newest Articles & Graphics
Our editorial team updates SKS every day with new articles and resources. Here’s a short list of the timeliest and most topical articles added to your product this month. Publication dates may vary due to the editorial selection process.
Don’t miss SIRS Renaissance's Literary Corner! You’ll find a curricular study of prominent authors in every major literary period and region, along with fresh author profiles. To connect, click the link to SIRS Renaissance on the main search page, and you’ll see a large Literary Corner link on the right side under Database Features.
SIRS Monthly Podcast
Don’t miss this month’s SIRS podcast, focusing on Student Bibliographies: Discovering Biographies.
Students are naturally curious about the past and the people who played a role in history. Who were our founding fathers? Who invented the automobile, or flew the first rocket into orbit?
SIRS Discoverer offers several gateways to biographical information. This month’s podcast will show you how to tap into biographies with a few clicks of your mouse!
First, click the subject search button on the main search page, then type in the name of a famous person. Click Search.
Select a subject heading from the results list, and explore the links!
Second, try a keyword search, and put the name of the famous person in quotes.
Individual SIRS content pieces matching the name will appear.
Third, in the Browse Content Tree area, click Notable People.
Recent articles related to famous people appears on the left; a handy listing of topics and subtopics is shown on the right. Select an article or topic to continue a more general search for famous people of the present or the past.
Fourth, under Database Features, click Biographies.
Conduct a biographical search here, or select a letter of the alphabet to browse for famous people.
Only biographical articles and resources will appear in the search results. This search will target all SIRS sources for information.
Lastly, click the Encyclopedia link near the bottom of the main search page.
This search will target only articles found in Encyclopedia Britannica's 17 thousand plus entries.
Download your copy of iTunes today, and subscribe to our free podcasts with a click of your mouse.
SIRS Leading Issues: This Month’s Top Picks
Our popular SIRS Leading Issues feature is dynamically updated daily with new content! New topics are added monthly along with "Your Top 10 Choices"--a list solely driven by end-user searches. Here's a list of some of our subscribers’ more commonly accessed topics:
November provides a variety of themes that focus on Health and Fitness: AIDS Awareness; Diabetes Awareness; Lung Cancer Awareness; Alzheimer’s Awareness; Child Safety Awareness; and Osteopathic Medicine.
The U.S. remains last of the leading countries in the world in providing universal health care coverage, especially preventive health care. With 47 million Americans uninsured, the nation’s health system is in crisis. More and more people are seeking treatment in emergency rooms because they have nowhere else to go.
Among the uninsured are more than a quarter of adults between ages 18 and 34. Experts estimate, unpaid hospital bills have reached $45 billion annually, raising the cost of health insurance by 8.5 percent for those who are insured.
For those who depend on hospital emergency rooms for their health care, the problem is greater than economics. Late diagnosis and treatment of many diseases often may be a precursor to death or disability when preventive care provided for the insured could have solved the problem.
Activity: Your SIRS Knowledge Source bundle includes access to SIRS Interactive Citizenship. This living digital textbook provides information and links on three significant topics for students: What Citizens Need to Know About Government; What Citizens Need to Know About World Affairs; and What Citizens Need to Know About Economics.
Click the Interactive Citizenship tab.
Click What Citizens Need to Know About Government.
Scroll down to and click Chapter 20 HEALTH CARE.
Note the variety of subtopics beginning with 20.1.
Assign different numbered subtopics to students so that a variety of reports and presentation with differing perspectives is possible (20.1 through 20.7). Scroll to the bottom of Chapter 20 and click the Learning Tools link.
Each student should click the links for Understanding Basic Knowledge, and Problem Solving. These will provide the guided and critical thinking formats for their reports and presentations.
Oral reports of about three minutes are a recommended format for presentation of mini-research reports. This is an excellent strategy for students to share their reasoned conclusions.
Students get practice in thinking on their feet both in the presentation and in any challenge opportunity created by the teacher for each presentation. Presentation skills are an important part of language arts and social studies essential skills standards. Oral reports also help to discourage plagiarism.
The use of source documents offers students a direct glimpse into the past. But without context, these sources can confuse as often as illuminate. SIRS Decades places these resources into a relevant framework for understanding that enriches both the content and student understanding of the material. SIRS Decades features more than 5,000 hand-selected primary and secondary source articles highlighting key events, movements, people, and places in 20th-century America.
Below are links to several primary source documents. To access the material, sign up for a free trial, login, and then click on each link.
Primary source types include: Advertisements, Editorial Cartoons, Letters, Memos, Messages, Maps and Charts, Original Documents, Original Works of Art, Photographs, Poems and Literary Works, Posters, Published Articles, Speeches and Addresses. Users will be able to save time by exploring thousands of primary sources in one integrated, user-friendly resource. Students will also be able to use these primary source documents to understand how historical events affected politics, popular culture, and the media.
PROQUEST PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: SIRS & ELIBRARY
Our professional development training program is a complete package that delivers the key processes to ensure successful program implementation, and the content to support ongoing use and customization across the entire curriculum.
The CEU-eligible program provides educators with research-based technology integration strategies and tools for customizing instruction and assessment using our SIRS and eLibrary online learning solutions. Schools receive the materials they need to build professional development and instructional models that can maximize teacher efficiency and effectiveness, and improve student achievement.
Educators receive rubrics, assessments, activities, and content designed to spur students' information literacy skills, critical thinking, and reading and writing abilities, while increasing their own technology usage. Plus, our flexible model ensures that all instructional staff in a school or system will benefit from the lessons learned.
Our fresh support for our line of SIRS solutions will train your teachers to fuse four types of literacy using SIRS resources with state and national learning standards. Find out more about this new program today--just in time for your spring training dates!
CultureGrams can help you broaden your students' understanding of the world and its peoples. Our World Edition includes 190+ country profiles, written for junior high students and older. CultureGrams also has a Kids Edition and a States Edition, geared for upper elementary students. These editions include kid-friendly profiles of 70+ countries and all 50 states, plus the District of Columbia.
CultureGrams goes beyond mere facts and figures to deliver an insider's perspective on daily life and culture, including the history, customs, and lifestyles of the world's people.
Country:
South Africa
Capital: Pretoria
Population: 44,344,136 (rank=27)
Area, sq. mi.: 471,445 (rank=24)
Area, sq. km.: 1,221,043
Real GDP per capita: $10,346
Adult literacy rate: 84% (male); 81% (female)
Infant mortality rate: 53 per 1,000 births
Life expectancy: 47 (male); 50 (female)
Did You Know?
Soccer, rugby, and cricket are the most important sports in South Africa.
South Africa is the richest country in Africa.
Among many ethnic groups, the groom must pay a lobola (bride-price) in the form of cattle or money to the bride's parents before a wedding can take place.
Greetings
Of the numerous greetings used in South Africa, the English phrases Hello and Good morning are understood by most people. Afrikaans speakers say Goeie môre (Good morning). Young English speakers say Howzit (slang for “How are you?”) to friends. A more formal Good morning or Good afternoon is common among adults. The Zulu and Swazis greet each other with Sawubona (literally, “I see you,” meaning “Hello”) or Kunjani (How are you?). An acceptable response to either is Yebo (Yes).
The Xhosa greeting, Molo, and the Sotho phrase, Dumela, have similar meanings to Sawubona. On parting, most South Africans use a phrase that assumes a future meeting. In other words, people rarely say good-bye. Rather, one says See you in English, Tot siens (Till we see each other again) in Afrikaans, or something like the Sotho Sala gashi (Go well in peace).
The Arts
South Africa boasts a diversity of musical styles. Choirs are common, and traditional folk songs have been integrated into choral music. The popular mbaqanga dance music originated in apartheid-era townships. Kwaito music, a favorite of young South Africans, mixes African melodies and lyrics with hip-hop and reggae. Kwela incorporates the distinctive penny whistle. South Africans are also devoted to the fine arts, and major cities host performances of the symphony, ballet, and opera. Gumboot dancing, developed by African gold miners, has become a popular performance art.
Economy
More than half of all of South Africa’s export earnings come from minerals and metals. South Africa is one of the world's largest producers of platinum and gold, and it also exports diamonds, chrome, and coal. Low gold prices on world markets have sometimes slowed that sector's growth. Wine and tourism are fast-growing industries. The industrial base is large and diversified, and new investment is allowing for growth. The government has privatized (in whole or in part) some of the largest state enterprises to improve market conditions and raise capital. Strong growth and investment will be necessary to reduce high unemployment and poverty.
Education
As in other areas of South African life, apartheid-era segregation in public education has been dismantled. However, it will take some time before all children receive the same opportunities within a uniform system. Many schools are without adequate texts or supplies. Schooling is compulsory to age 15. Africans receive instruction in their native language until the seventh grade, and then they usually are taught in English after that. Afrikaans is also offered as a language of instruction. In urban areas, an increasing number of primary schools teach in English. There are 19 universities in South Africa.
To find out more about CultureGrams, connect to our website today.
As world events increasingly affect all our lives, it’s more important than ever to educate students about the world around them. CultureGrams and World Conflicts Today show students how the world’s peoples live... and what’s behind the major conflicts they face.
CultureGrams concise, reliable, and up-to-date information delivers a true insider’s perspective on daily life and culture of the world’s people. Explore 190 country reports that include 25 cultural categories, maps, images, bios, glossaries, statistics, and five local recipes per country.
World Conflicts Today provides new ways to understand the high-profile conflicts currently engulfing many of the world’s nations. Unbiased overviews of the history, background, obstacles, and implications analyze each conflict, alongside primary and secondary sources, interactive maps, slide shows, and other multimedia.
Conflicts include Afghanistan, Basque Country, Chechnya, Colombia, Darfur, Iraq, Jammu & Kashmir, Korean Peninsula, Northern Ireland, and the Palestinian Territories.
Together you get more than facts and figures; you give students unbiased cultural and social insights they won’t find in any textbook, website, or encyclopedia.
You can save 20% off World Conflicts with purchase of both* by 12/31/06.
And, with district purchases you may be eligible for up to 40% off CultureGrams!
* Existing CultureGrams Online subscribers are eligible
You’ll see why School Library Journal recommends CultureGrams for, “History, geography, foreign language, ESL, and current events teachers…[for] discussions, debates, presentations, research papers, reports, and reading and writing exercises.”
For more information, contact ProQuest toll-free at 1.800.521.0600, or by email at PQSales@il.proquest.com.
Each month, our SKS WebSelect™ and Discoverer WebFind™ editorial teams scour the Internet for top-quality sites that help teachers teach and students learn. Although no Internet site can supplant a quality research database, these vetted resources offer unique resources that are sure to be of interest.
Discover what makes us human in this paleoanthropology site, which "includes an interactive documentary, educational exhibits, research tools, and the latest news from scientists across the globe." (IHO)
"Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP) has existed for more than one hundred and sixty million years in one species of jellyfish. In 1994 it was cloned. Now GFP is found in laboratories all over the world where it is used in every conceivable plant and animal. Flatworms, algae, E. coli and pigs have all been made to fluoresce with GFP." (MARC ZIMMER, CONNECTICUT COLLEGE) Learn about the history and structure of GFP and view interesting photos, including one of a pig with a fluorescent yellow snout and hooves.
This companion site to "The Net at Risk" contains multimedia, resources, and questions regarding net neutrality and the future of the Internet. Watch the preview to learn "how mega-media corporations could restrict the democratic possibilities of the Web's new future." (PBS)
Our ProQuest product trainers are standing by to help you get the most out of your subscription--and learn more about our other digital learning resources! We offer a wide variety of online training sessions each month.
Plus, all attendees can easily obtain a Certificate of Attendance (right) for any of our online courses! The certificate documents the course name, amount of class time, date, and verifies attendance. You can use the certificate to document attendance in the class and submit it along with the additional documentation your school district requires to award you with continuing education credits.
Be sure to tell your trainer that you would like to receive a certificate via email at the start of each class. They’ll be glad to help!
You can download three ready-to-print versions of forthcoming training dates and times in PDF format.
Our training sessions cover after-school hours within several time zones. Best of all, there's no cost to participate. All you need is a computer with Internet access, a phone, and one hour.
What features of your SIRS subscription do you and your students find the most useful? Have you recently used or are you planning to use SIRS as part of an assignment or student research project? How do you and other curriculum leaders in your institution use your ProQuest educational resources?
Share your experiences with peers working in schools across the country and around the world--through an upcoming Product News Bulletin! We're waiting to hear from you. Please send your ideas and stories to: tim.mclain@il.proquest.com
If we choose your submission, we'll contact you for additional information and permission to use your story in a future issue.
FORWARD TO A COLLEAGUE + EMAIL SERVICE INFORMATION
Increase the usage of your digital learning resources! Our forward to a friend service makes it easy to instantly send this product bulletin--and all the great ideas and information it contains--to others in your subscribing institution with a click of your mouse.
Also, be sure to encourage them to sign up for our SIRS, CultureGrams, ProQuest, ProQuest Historical Newspapers, eLibrary, eLibrary Curriculum Edition, and additional enewsletters as appropriate.
To change your email address, sign up for additional newsletter titles, or modify your subscription settings, click here.
ProQuest offers a growing family of K-12 classroom-focused,
subscription-based online research tools. Many of these education solutions offer reading level-linked
(lexile) content, support
21st-century information
literacy skills, and help schools differentiate instruction across all curriculum areas.
Learn more about all of our tools here, tap into our training resources and videos, and don't miss our new eLibrary research tool (more). We also have a pair of special resource pages just for teachers (with lesson plans) and librarians.
Cordially,
Your ProQuest K-12 Team
Your SIRS license agreement gives us permission to send you email about product upgrades, special offers, and new services. If you'd like to discontinue receiving these messages, you may unsubscribe. If you have any questions or are having difficulty, please send email to Tim McLain. Thanks for your interest in SIRS and ProQuest!
One of the most popular features available in SIRS Researcher is our That’s Debatable Poll.
Don’t miss this month’s SIRS podcast, focusing on Student Bibliographies: 
Our popular SIRS Leading Issues feature is dynamically updated daily with new content! New topics are added monthly along with "Your Top 10 Choices"--a list solely driven by end-user searches. Here's a list of some of our subscribers’ more commonly accessed topics:
The use of source documents offers students a direct glimpse into the past. But without context, these sources can confuse as often as illuminate. SIRS Decades places these resources into a relevant framework for understanding that enriches both the content and student understanding of the material. SIRS Decades features more than 5,000 hand-selected primary and secondary source articles highlighting key events, movements, people, and places in 20th-century America.
Country:
