#6 b - Citation Pearl-Growing Search

Another method of search is the citation pearl-growing or snowball approach search. For this search, I used the Library Literature database. I used the same topic as the last search method.

The results are as follows:

Question: What books are good for elementary children to share with parents?

S1: books or novels

S2: elementary or children

S3: parents or family

S4: S1 AND S2 And S3

After conducting the S4 search, I received 601 hits. I looked through a few of the articles per page for the first 6 pages of results. A common word that I kept seeing, that I didn't even think to add to my list of search words, was literature. I revised my search to include literature as a keyword and received 639 results. The following result uses literature in the Subject(s) listing. Title: The New York Times Parent's Guide to the Best Books for Children. 3rd edition, Revised and Updated

Author: Eden Ross Lipson

Publisher: Three Rivers Press (NY)

Publication Year: 2000

Pages: 530

Physical Description; Illustration

Language of Document: English
ISBN: 0-8129-3018-5 (paperback)

Price: $18

Were I to continue using this search method, my next search modification would be to add either library/librarian or teacher to my search. The book chosen would be an excellent resource for parents, teachers and/or librarians to use. Without realizing it, I have used this method many times when searching for a topic without really knowing the name for the type of search I was using. It works by adding to your results (thus the name: snowballing) but it is narrowing your topic to more specific facets of what you are truly looking for.