Welcome (back) to university! Whether you’re a new student or returning for another year, your Subject Librarian is here to help you get the best out of the library resources at Aberystwyth.
Each department has a subject librarian (a list of them can be found here)
Here are some of the things they can help with:
Finding your way around the library.
Getting to grips with the library catalogue (Primo) including:
Finding Books and Articles: Get help locating books, journal articles, and other materials for your work.
Accessing Databases: Learn how to navigate academic databases to find high-quality information.
Understanding how to evaluate the information that you find and how to spot possible misinformation.
Learning how to properly reference and cite your sources in various styles (APA, Harvard, MLA, etc.)
You can schedule a one-on-one meeting with your librarian here, or you will usually find one of the team on the Level F desk on the top floor of the Hugh Owen Library between the hours of 10am and 5pm.
For more information on our library services see our Library Guides here.
Don’t think that we’ve forgotten teachers or researchers. Do contact your subject librarian with any library-related questions and we’ll do our best to help. You can also find information on our Teacher’s Library Guide here, and our Researcher’s Library Guide here.
Today is Shwmae Su’mae Day, a day to celebrate and promote the Welsh language.
You’ll have plenty of opportunities during your time at Aber to learn and to use Welsh, so here’s a quick peek at some of the ways to make the most of it!
Remember you can also download apps, such as Duolingo, to practise your skills between classes.
Library Resources
If you are on your journey to learning Welsh, thinking about starting it, or you’re a Welsh speaker looking to polish your skills, the library has a wide-range of helpful resources.
Head to theCeltic Collection on Level F of the Hugh Owen Library where you’ll find books to help you practise and develop your reading and speaking skills – from graded novels with vocabulary to grammar books to complete language courses.
And remember to say su’mae and more to the Library staff! You can identify the ones who speak or are learning Welsh by their ‘Speak Welsh” lanyards or badges.
Studying and learning through the medium of Welsh
The wealth of AberSkills skills development resources are available in both English and Welsh. The librarians offer workshops in both languages also – workshops will be held in the language of their title on the listing page: https://www.aber.ac.uk/en/aberskills/skills-workshops/
And did you know? You can use most IS systems and services including Primo, LibGuides and Aspire Reading Lists in Welsh or English. Click on the language on the top right of the webpage or on the globe icon to switch between languages.
UMCA provides a voice and community for Welsh speaking students, learners and the curious! They also host Welsh-speaking events and cultural events, and give learners the opportunity to meet and practice their Welsh with Welsh speakers. Follow UMCA on social media to learn more.
These days, it feels like you can’t go a minute without someone bringing up AI. It’s as if it has always been part of our everyday lives! But believe it or not, it’s only been about 18 months since OpenAI’s ChatGPT burst onto the scene and really kicked off the AI revolution (or all the AI hype, depending on your point of view!)
Whichever term you prefer, AI isn’t going away anytime soon, so in the coming weeks we will explore some of the most popular generative AI tools. We’ll review some of their features, discuss their limitations, and provide a few quick tips on how to use them effectively.
As ChatGPT was the first generative AI tool to really capture the popular imagination, let’s take a closer look at what it can do, and how you can get the best out of it.
As the name suggests, ChatGPT (as with a number of the AI tools we’ll look at in this series) is designed for conversation. Its simple interface enables users to interact with an AI tool that has been trained on a vast amount of data. This training allows it to generate human-like responses to prompts (a prompt can be a question, statement, or command that guides the AI to generate a response.) For more on prompts, visit our AI Guide.
Here’s a closer look at what ChatGPT (and other AI tools) can do:
Answer Questions: ChatGPT can provide information and explanations on a variety of topics, making it a helpful resource for learning.
Generate Written Content: ChatGPT is excellent for overcoming writer’s block and for checking your writing for grammar, spelling, clarity, and style.
Summarise Information: It can take long texts and condense them into shorter summaries, helping you to grasp the main points quickly.
Translate Languages: ChatGPT can translate text from one language to another, making it easier for people to communicate and understand each other.
Engage in Conversations: The tool can simulate conversations, making it a fun way to practice language skills, prepare for a job interview, or simply have a friendly chat.
For further information on what AI tools like ChatGPT can do, visit our AI Guide.
Using ChatGPT can be useful (and fun!) but please do bear in mind there can be drawbacks to using it.
For example:
Misleading Information: ChatGPT can sometimes provide incorrect, out of date, or biased answers, which may affect the quality of your work or understanding.
An Over-Reliance on Technology: Relying too much on ChatGPT may hinder critical thinking and creativity, as users might depend on it for answers instead of developing their own ideas.
Plagiarism Risks: Students may use AI to generate content that is not their own, leading to plagiarism issues.
For further information on the drawbacks of using AI tools like ChatGPT, visit our AI Guide.
Top Tips for Using Chat GPT:
Be Clear and Specific: When you ask ChatGPT a question or give it a task, be as clear and detailed as possible. The more specific you are, the better the AI can understand what you need and provide a relevant response.
Start Simple: Begin with straightforward requests. If you have a complex question or task, break it down into smaller parts. This helps ChatGPT focus on one thing at a time, leading to better answers.
Use Follow-Up Questions: ChatGPT can maintain the context of a conversation so don’t hesitate to ask follow-up questions or give additional details after the initial response. This allows you to refine the conversation and get more accurate or tailored information.
For further information on the effective use of ChatGPT, visit our AI Guide.
A few caveats:
Aberystwyth University does not currently endorse any of these AI tools.
You must follow the guidelines on the use of AI issued by your department (where available)
In our next blog: we will look at prompt engineering, and we’ll share some valuable tips on how effective prompt design can improve the accuracy and relevance of AI outputs.
Are you looking for UK data about a particular industry?
We subscribe to a comprehensive resource called IBIS World. There are nearly 13,000 industry reports online, which are all easily searchable.
Each industry has its own report which is broken down into the following chapters;
At a glance
Performance
Products and Markets
Geographic Breakdown
Competitive Forces
Companies
External Environment
Financial Benchmarks
Whether you’re looking for the average wage for that industry or trying to find out the key markets. The information is presented in manageable sections and with clear downloadable graphics.
Example of a chart from IBIS World
There’s a useful ‘At a glance’ summary for each UK industry, providing a snapshot of the revenue, a SWOT analysis and a detailed Executive Summary.
IBIS World is available on and off campus 24/7 and the reports can be downloaded in full or by chapter. Don’t forget, if you use the IBIS world data in your assignments, to acknowledge this. Further help is available in our Referencing and Plagiarism Guide: https://libguides.aber.ac.uk/c.php?g=676952&p=5122582
Do you want to develop your academic writing skills, learn about using the library and its resources, get to grips with referencing, or improve your employability skills?
Good news! These topics and more are covered in the Semester 1 AberSkills programme, which is available for free for all students at Aberystwyth University.
AberSkills Workshops take place throughout the academic year and are a mixture of face to face and online sessions. Most sessions are offered in both Welsh and English.
All workshops are listed on the AberSkills website. Take a look to see what’s available and book your place in a click.
If you miss a session and want to catch-up, academic skills and library workshop teaching materials for 2023-2024 are available on Blackboardunder Organisations. 2024-2025 workshop teaching materials will be uploaded soon after the session.
Your Subject Librarian team have been hard at work over the “summer” (seriously, did it ever stop raining?) to bring you a newly updated AI Guide which outlines how you can use AI to get the best out of the library’s resources.
AI and the Library
Screenshot from the new AI and the Library LibGuide
The Guide offers advice on:
How you might use AI.
Some of the AI tools that might be useful for you.
The benefits of using AI over traditional search engines.
The appropriate and ethical use of AI tools.
Effective prompt building.
Some of the potential risks of using AI (including issues around copyright infringement, bias, and data protection).
As a companion to the Guide, we are going to offer a series of blog posts which will look at the advice given in the guide in more detail and offer some practical tips for using AI.
Here’s a sneak peek of what you can expect in the coming weeks:
Reviews of AI tools.
Practical advice on effective prompt building.
Developing smart keyword searches.
Discovering resources related to your area of study.
Evaluating AI outputs by applying the CRAAP test.
The risks of using AI.
We hope that you will find our Guide and the series of blog posts useful. It is important to stress that you must follow the guidelines on the use of AI issued by your department (where available).
Journal hijacking and fraudulent journal sites are becoming an increasing problem for journal authors, publishers and readers. Publishing scams aim to exploit researchers, promising quick publication but charging excessive publication fees. These sites can often be a clone of an established journal, set up to extract fees from unsuspecting authors.
Early Modern Books covers material from the British Isles and Europe for the period 1450-1700. An integrated search across both Early English Books Online and Early European Books allows scholars to view materials from over 225 source libraries worldwide. EEBO’s content draws on authoritative short-title catalogues of the period and features many text transcriptions specially created for the product. Content from Europe covers the curated Early European Books Collections from 4 national libraries and London’s Wellcome Library.
Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) is a vast eighteenth-century library at your desktop—a fully text-searchable corpus of books, pamphlets and broadsides in all subjects printed between 1701 and 1800. It currently contains over 180,000 titles amounting to over 32 million fully-searchable pages.
