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Unit 1.
Databases and electronic libraries for English Studies 1
Last update Oct 18th 2019
Unit 1. Databases and electronic libraries for English Studies

Table of contents
Brainstorming ............................................................................................................................ 2
Initial questionnaire ................................................................................................................... 2
Aims and learning results .......................................................................................................... 2
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2
Contents .................................................................................................................................... 2
Part I. Information literacy ..................................................................................................... 3
Databases & Bibliographic Platforms ................................................................................ 5
Generic bibliographic databases ..................................................................................... 13
Open online resources .................................................................................................... 20
Part II. Web syndication as a research tool ................................................................ 31

To sum up… ............................................................................................................................ 33
Final questions ........................................................................................................................ 33
Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 33
Unit 1. Databases and electronic libraries for English Studies 2
Brainstorming
Answer and discuss the following questions in the forum created for unit 1. There is a thread
opened with this aim.
 Do you know what a database is?

 Have you ever used a database to search for any sort of information?
 Have you ever read an article in its electronic version?
 Do you know what RSS is?
Initial questionnaire
Take some minutes to fill up the following form and submit it electronically. This will allow the
teaching team to learn about your previous knowledge on the subject.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=es&formkey=dDhnRmNTc19fRFBkU1YtS3F
BSUdLd0E6MQ#gid=0
Once you have completed the form, take a few minutes to see the percentage of the respondents
(students enrolled in this subject from 2010-2011) admit beginning their researches using Google.
Take a look at the other options. What about Think about the results retrieved for a moment. We
will see If your answers will have changed by the end of this course.
Aims and learning results
This unit will be focused on explaining how to plan a well-documented research with the help of
technology. By the end of this chapter you will have learnt:
• How to search for the information that you need and where to find it
• How to handle the databases that you need
• How to find the exact location of an e-article
• How to keep your own research findings and be alerted of anything new
Introduction
As mentioned in the general introduction, this first part of the course will be focused on
the first digital competence that includes the Digital Competence Framework for Citizens,
published in 2017 by the UE: http://tinyurl.com/y7pd77aa (pg 23). This competence implies to
able to search, evaluate and manage information depending on our needs, in this case, the field
of English Studies. This chapter will deal with the first two actions, and the third will be studied
in the next unit. This competence will be crucial to face the first part of your TFG. You will be able
to know how to locate the information to need from trustful resources, which are relevant to the
field of study of your interest.
Contents
Nowadays we can find new tools in university libraries which gather all sorts of resources.
We will look at each of them independently so that you can get a clearer idea of what each tool
can offer and how we can get the best of it for our aims. We will show different databases related
to our area of knowledge, ranging from the most specific ones to the other more general so that
you get to know how to search for information effectively. One of the first tasks that any researcher
has to do is to check a database or an electronic journal provider.
Part I. Information literacy
The concept of Information Literacy has received different definitions, mainly conditioned by the
technological context of the moment. If we compare the way of conducting some research
nowadays with the methods used twenty years ago, we will understand the role that technology
and digitalisation have meant in the last few years. The American Library Association (ALA)
defined IL (Information Literacy) as a skill or an ability to “recognize when information is needed
and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information” in 1989.
Sixteen years later the same concept is described as “the set of integrated abilities encompassing
the reflective discovery of information, the understanding of how information is produced and
valued, and the use of information in creating new knowledge and participating ethically in
communities of learning”. The last definition includes two key elements which must be present in
the head of all researchers and academics: "ethics" and "communities". Ethics to mention the
source of our findings (e.g. essays), and "communities", conceived as spaces to share and enrich
our knowledge (Løkse et al., 2017).
Activity 1.1 Knowing our Library
Log in to campus UNED and visit our library. Think about your favourite subject and try to do a
search related to it. Consider to consult some database first (recursos electrónicos), and then
narrow your search to a journal, book (paper or e-book), report, or any other type of source.
Have a look at some of the links related to your studies (TFG, Plagiarism, Canal Biblioteca, etc.)
When accessing the catalogue, you will see that there are different library locations at UNED
(Sede Central). These are:
1. Humanidades Senda del Rey /Obispo Trejo (Humanidades, Ciencias, Derecho,

Económicas, etc. ),
2. Juán del Rosal (Educación, / Escuelas de Ingeniería).
3. Juán del Rosal (Psicología)
Although all of them share the same e-resources, each building keeps its own paper
books related to the degrees they coordinate, as well as other topics of interest. If you visit some
of these buildings with your own computer, do not forget to access the internet via Eduroam, a
special configuration that you need to prepare on your computer using your Campus UNED
password. If you are accessing the e-resources from the campus (or any other computer
connected from your local centre) you will have full access to the subscribed materials directly. If
you are accessing from home or outside the campus, you will need to login first at Campus UNED
and use the links created for that aim.
Remember that our library holds several training courses all through the year and most of them
can be followed live on the Internet. Visit the library website for more information.
After that, write about your experience in the forum for unit 1. Was it difficult to find things there?
Did you miss anything?
Databases & Bibliographic Platforms
In the same way the concept of Information Literacy has experienced some variations with the
evolution of technology, the meaning of bibliographic database has changed as well. We have
selected a definition found in the Wikipedia:
A bibliographic database is a database of bibliographic records, an organised digital

collection of references to published literature, including journals and newspaper articles,
conference proceedings, reports, government and legal publications, patents, books, etc.
If at the very beginning these databases provided only information about bibliographic references,
nowadays they have been integrated with journal provider and other bibliographic platforms so
that you can have direct access to the full-text source that you need to consult (e-journal, thesis,
e-book, etc.). In this way, you can visualise an article through two or even three platforms bought
by your library. These platforms can serve as databases as well, and on many occasions, it is
difficult to draw a border between the former and the latter. If you perform a search in MLA
(Modern Language Association) International Bibliography or a library catalogue, they will show
different content providers depending on the ones subscribed by your institution.
What it is important to know is that if you want to read an electronic article, your University/
Institution needs to be subscribed at that time including the date when it was published; otherwise,
you will have to try luck with another library. Sometimes you may find "embargo" years, that
means you cannot read articles published in that period of time. Everything depends on the
contract and conditions signed by the library or institution. Most UNED subscribed services are
possible thanks to an agreement called Consorcio Madroño, signed by most public universities
located in Madrid (except for UCM, Universidad Complutense de Madrid).
As you can see below, there are some databases which can be consulted through "Consorcio
Madroño" by all its members, but other which can only be consulted by some Universities (second
group of resources). Depending on the field, you can find journals of interest in the field of English
Studies in some of the databases shown below (i.e. MLA, JSTOR, Isi Web of Knowledge, etc. ).
Figure 1 Image taken from https://www.consorciomadrono.es/en/recursos-electronicos/
 MLA (Modern Languages Association) publications
MLA is an association of professionals related to the field of languages and humanistic

disciplines founded in 1883 to promote the teaching of English Studies all around the world.
You are read more about this on this link: https://www.mla.org/About-Us/About-the-
MLA/The-MLA-s-Mission. MLA has particularly known thanks to its two databases:
MLA International Bibliography, which includes Linguistics, Literature, Culture and

Cinema bibliographic references (books and articles). In the case of UNED, it is provided
by ProQuest. If we type the word "Shakespeare", the engine will retrieve almost 50.000
results, which means that we need to sharpen more our search, filtering by the sort of
work (book, journal, proceeding, etc.), year of publication or language. Note that if your
Institution Is not subscribe to one of the results, like in the first case, no "full-text" link will
appear. This means that you cannot read the whole article, but only the abstract. Visit
this link to access: http://tinyurl.com/y6rth6fy
MLA Directory of Periodicals, which is a directory of information about the journals which
are indexed in the bibliography. This is more relevant for academics to know some
information about a journal related to this field (language, subscription, frequency, editors,
website, etc.). Being included in this list represents some evidence of "quality". You can
access from a link on the previous page or typing this URL: http://tinyurl.com/y22rlyb5 . As
you can see, there are RSS icons to receive apdating alerts of all the publications. Once
there, you can locate publications searching by the title of by subject:
Apart from being famous by its databases, MLA is also a book of academic style, one of
the most widely used in English Literature. Others like APA are preferred when dealing
with topics dealing with education and social sciences.
https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/
 ERIC (Education Resources Information Center). It is the most important database

dealing with Education. It can be reached freely by an independent researcher using his/her
own account. However, many institutions like UNED access through the EBSCO or
ProQuest platforms. It can also be considered as a repository because you can find several
publications in full-text view. You could even submit your own publications as a registered
user. As you can see below, you can filter per year, descriptor, education level, etc.
 J-STOR. Apart from providing contents from several e-books and journals related to
Language Studies, among other topics, you will find primary resources (digitalised
manuscripts of historical documents. Also, there is a new tool called "text analyser" which
consists of scanning an article to find other articles of interest related to the text itself. The
image below shows one of the digitalised documents. Its reference can be easily saved,
but the possibility to read all the pages is restricted to individual subscriptions.
Literature Online (LION)
It has a collection of full-text works in English dating from the Anglo-Saxon period to the
present. In order to have full access, you need to be logged in at Campus UNED. It was first
launched in 1996, and more than 20 years later, it is a reference in its field thanks to the quantity
and the quality of its contents. You will reach this resource from this link
http://literature.proquest.com.ezproxy.uned.es/ . You may find this other screen if you access fro
the databases listed in the library. In that case, you will have to choose either the second or the
third option if you are outside UNED.
Observ that this is one of the databases provided by ProQuest. You can also select and
perform searches in the data bases at the same time by clicking on “databases”.
Activity 1. 2 Working with LION

Do a simple search of any author included in the contents of some of the Literature subjects
delivered in this Degree. What sort of sources and documents have you found? Did you find this
tool useful? Share your experience in the forum.
Other databases not subscribed by UNED
Linguistics Collection (Full coverage of phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and

semantics and more).
Apart from articles and other electronic resources, you can find full-text dissertations which cover
the areas mentioned before. This database can be consulted from the University of Granada
library vía ProQuest.
You can find more information here http://media2.proquest.com/documents/linguistics-

collection.pdf
Linguistics Abstracts Online
It is a database of linguistics abstracts containing more than 72000 abstracts extracted from more
than 600 specialised journals. If you need to use it, you can access from Universitat de Barcelona
or Granada.
Although UNED is not subscribed to this resource, it has acquired a similar one
named Oxford Bibliographies, where you will find out commented bibliographies
related to very specific topics included in the field of Linguistics. You can see
how it works in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1myXLJZGPwM :
America: History and Life
This database belongs to EBSCO and provides access to the following list of journals
dealing with the history of the United States of America from 1955 to the present. A total of 1800
titles are shown in the lists that can be seen in the following link:
http://www.ebscohost.com/titleLists/31h-coverage.pdf
Thanks to a database like this, you can have access to digitalised images of
ancient texts from your own institution with the possibility to zoom images, print
some pages, take your own time to read any work in detail, etc. Unfortunately,
UNED is not subscribed, but you can try for free with the demo announced on
its website or locating a subscribed institution. There is a similar one but
including previous years, which is subscribed by our university: European Views
of the Americas: 1493 to 1750 (EBSCO). It can be accessed through this link:
http://tinyurl.com/y9gtwkju
 Early English books online (EEBO)

It contains digital facsimile page images of most of the works printed in England,
Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and as well as works in
English from 1473-1700. It has access to full-text documents in different
disciplines: Fine Arts, English Literature, Linguistics or History. It can be
consulted through ProQuest in some institutions. This link
http://tinyurl.com/yd3jkh52 contains a list of online webinars to learn how to use
this database, not only to about this database but others like LION.
Generic bibliographic databases
 Dialnet (UNED)
It is a Spanish database developed by the University of La Rioja. It has already reached more
than 2.000.000 users and it has become one of the main references for most of the researchers
and professors working in Spanish universities. The access to some full-text versions of the
entries depends on the sort of involvement of your institution, having the possibility to borrow a
document from other institution if it is required. The following screenshot shows a list of journals
included in Dialnet with full-text links (only if you are logged in with an institution subscribed to the
journal/article that you are searching). This service is known as Dialnet Plus. Most of the
publications linked here are based in Spain, which means that most of them will be written in
Spanish except for some edited by associations directly related to English Studies.
The image below shows some English Studies publications included at Dialnet database. Those
marked with UNED on their right have the full texts available through our library.
If you want to subscribe to some of these journals, you need to sign up before, and once
logged in, click on "Revistas", selecting your topic/s and choose those of you interest:
Once you select the journals, do not expect any sort of confirmitation. Just click on
"subscriptions" to check that you got subscribed succesully to the selected journals.
Activity 1.3 Working with Dialnet
Create an account at Dialnet (https://dialnet.unirioja.es/) and subscribe to 3 publications

related to a topic of your interest. Try to read some full-text articles and share your
experience in the forum. Does it have a friendly interface? Was it easy to find authors or
articles?
 Other generic databases
Apart from the databases above, you can other find articles related to English Studies in
Science Direct 1, one of the leading bibliographic platforms which has recently acquired others
such as Elsevier 2 (focused on Science and Health publications) or Scopus (recently subscribed
by the UNED library 3). Apart from having more than 2,500 journals and 11,000 books, they have
1
https://www2.uned.es/biblioteca/basesdedatos/sciencedirect.html
2
https://www2.uned.es/biblioteca/basesdedatos/sciencedirect.html
3
https://www2.uned.es/biblioteca/basesdedatos/scopus.html
devoted a great effort to digitalise many articles written before 1995. Among other functionalities,
it allows you to obtain a list with the 25 most cited references in any of the subscribed journals.
This list shows the results retrieved for "Discourse".
As it is shown above, you can download different articles at the same time by selecting them,
export to different bibliographic formats or applying a filter to sharpen your search.
EBSCO
EBSCO, the other world's leading information and publishing company along with
Science Direct, will lead you to many other databases like European Views of the Americas: 1493
to 1750, Teacher Reference Center or even e-books like EBSCO eClassics Collection among
others. This is the appearance of one of the results retrieved when searching something about
Information Literacy in a database called Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts.
Take into account that in the case, there will be no full-text versions, only abstract. Once you have
that information, you will need to look for the whole article in the library catalogue or Linceo (it will
be seen later).
As seen above, there is a menu on your right where you can see all the actions you can
take with the selected bibliographic reference (download to your Google Drive, save in a folder,
print or even share it.
REBIUN
Databases like the ones described before must be purchased by our institutions to facilitate the
research study of its undergraduates and postgraduates. Finding all of them in the same
University is unusual. That is why, in the past, you needed to travel to another location (if you are
writing a PhD or enrolled in some master course) to look for the desired database or paper books.
Nowadays there are easier solutions to cover these needs, for example, borrowing books from
other libraries from your University if they are in paper format.
REBIUN http://www.rebiun.org/Paginas/Inicio.aspx is a collective catalogue comprised by most

Spanish University Libraries where you can find the exact location of a resource from anywhere.
The image below shows the location of a database which cannot be found at UNED, Linguistics
Abstracts Online. It says that you can consult it from the Universities of Coruña and Seville. If it
was a paper
 ExLibris, the new UNED Library platform
During the academic year 2019-20, Consorcio Madroño, and with It, all the libraries
included, migrated from Linceo + (Summon technology) to ExLibris 4, a ProQuest tool used by
many other universities to manage their library catalogues. To use, type in the search space
for any specific topic so that you will retrieve several resources (e.g. Library Management)
You will be required to identify yourself even if you have done it before proceeding.
4
https://www.exlibrisgroup.com/
Once there, you will be able to filter your selection (there are more options apart from the ones
shown in this screenshot). You can narrow your search to a range of years, authors, disciplines,
etc.
If you select some of the retrieved results, you will get detailed information about the item:
- the pin means that you have saved that reference,

- the attachment symbol with the "full-text available" indication means that you read the whole
article. Sometimes you will obtain it automatically with just a click (like in this case), but on other
occasions, you will need to look for the volume, issue, etc. The database that contains this article
is an open journal platform, so that If can be accessed from anywhere withing the need to be
subscribed.
- the "sent to" section convert the reference Into different formats to be managed by specialised
software (e.g. Mendeley or RefWorks), but we will deepen on this topic In the second unit.
- the "citation" option allows you to obtain the citation of the reference In different styles:
to include some of these citations to your work, simply copy and paste the desired syle into you
paper.
You can also "pin" more than one references to export them to your database, but we will see It
later In the second unit.
Activity.1.4 Knowing the UNED catalogue (ExLibris Platform)
Use some of the e-resources mentioned in this section and try to access them by using ExLibris.
Make sure you have previously logged in with your Campus UNED account. Try to do the same
with Madroño Primo Catalogue: http://www.consorciomadrono.es/en/servicios/catalogo-
colectivo/ Take into account that some online resources access could not be accessible from our
university. Remember that you can share your doubt and experience in the forum thread created
for this activity on the online course.
Open online resources
Google Scholar
Along with Linceo, Google Scholar is probably one of the most useful used search
engines in the academic world. Each result will add links to different catalogues and different
ways to keep the reference if you have configured previously. Additionally, you can create alerts
so that you receive an email if something new has been published in relation to your "keyword".
You can also follow the publications of some authors from your profile.
Once in "settings", you could add some access links to your library/Institution. This way,
anytime you perform a search from Google Scholar, you will know If you can get it from
your library In Its full-text version or not. Bear in mind that If the entry Is a "citation", you
will probably do not find the primary source with a simple click.
 Google Books
Although to read most of the books in the complete version they need to be bought first, the
sample view can help you make an idea of the contents inside and, in cases a few pages would
be enough. You can order them using your own shelves and create a wish-list to buy them If you
need them. The image below shows some books ordered by shelves.
 E-journals
Each library has its own collection of e-journals depending on the packs that have been
bought from the main journal retailers. The following images show how to access the e-
journals subscribed by the library. Consider that is possible that you need to visit the library
onsite because some of these journals are published only in the paper version.
Imagine that we perform a search on "Language" and you retrieve the following results:
The title of the journal appears In the first place, then we find the years subscribed by the
library, and the journal provider /database to locate the full-text version. See how, in some
cases, such as the fourth example, you can find the journal in different providers, with different
periods of time subscribed. Open Access Journal means that all the journals contained
provide free access to the complete text of each article.
The following picture shows one of the journals mentioned before. Once you are o its platform,
you will be able to access the full-text version thanks to the subscription of the library (green
colour) or to the open policy of some numbers (orange). This varies from one platform to
another. Look at the orange Icons (they will be described later). The menu on the right shows
the volumes, Issues and year of publication. These elements will be useful when looking for
your references and cite them later.
Although most of the e-journals subscribed by UNED can be found through the library
website, there might be variations depending on the embargos, updating, etc. This is the
reason why we recommend looking for the journal on the meta-searcher, and then try if you
can access the full text or not. The most important collections are Willey Online, Academic
Search Premier, Ingenta, Sweetswise, Springerlink, Taylor & Francis, Sage Journals, Oxford
Journals, Cambridge University Press, etc. You do not need to learn by heart to which journal
belongs to each journal, but getting familiar with their interfaces would help to extract their
information quickly.
Each of the bibliographic references displayed by these electronic resources shares very
similar options: printing, saving references following different standards, sending through
email or exporting to some bibliographic formats among many other functions.
 E-books
In the same way, as most academic journals are becoming digital, the number of ebooks
as an alternative to the traditional paper books is increasing too. These are some of the most
useful eBook platforms which may be of interest for the English Studies disciplines:
- Ebook central (ebrary before) http://tinyurl.com/y8fsvfwe . It is a platform owned by ProQuest

which, apart from containing books edited by the UNED- some of them basic textbooks-,
includes an extensive collection of work from different areas. Creating an account is compulsory
for reading books, but also, you will be able to create selves, taking notes, adding favourites,
highlighting, etc.
- O’Reilly Safari Books Online gives you “access to our 35K+ books, 30K+ hours of video, curated learning
paths, case studies, interactive tutorials, audiobooks, and O'Reilly conference videos”. It is a good place to
find handbooks to learn how to use different applications, all of them extremely new. You need to access
from our library link and write your UNED email account at the very beginning. As seen from the image
below, you can create your own playlists of content, highlight, and share resources with other colleagues.
You can also find multimedia contents:
You can also find audio-visual content among as a way of training yourself, for example, this course to learn
how to use Microsoft Teams 365 https://learning.oreilly.com/videos/office-365-
teams/031365TEAMS2/031365TEAMS2-C1L6Z:
If you want to know more about Office 365, you can follow this playlist:
https://learning.oreilly.com/playlists/b0d77011-6529-4762-98f5-a1c4ab59cac3
- Elsevier / Science Direct. Apart from being one of the most widely used journal
providers, you can find some specialised ebooks. Some of them are a compilation of chapters
written by different authors, which are very similar to articles. Their references are very easy
to export to different formats. We will learn how to do this in the next unit.
Figure 2 Example taken from http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.uned.es/science/book/9780081001707
E-BUNED is another platform to read ebooks based on xebook 5 technology, which is

being used by many public libraries in Spain. Although you need to borrow this book from
the library for a limited time, you can skim the book using "hojear"
5
http://xercode.es/2012/06/18/xebook-citado-en-la-mesa-redonda-los-desafios-de-los-profesionales-
frente-al-libro-digital/
Click here to read
 Open Access Libraries
Gutenberg Project 6
It is a very well-known project that has been compiling classic books in English to spread
literature and the love for literature in general on the Internet. Now there are versions in other
languages such as French, Portuguese and Dutch language. It has more than 60.000 ebooks
ready to read. It is very useful to locate the first editions of classic books. As you can see in the
image below, the same text can be read in different formats, included those to be read in ebook
devices.
6
http://www.gutenberg.org/
Open Library 7 is a library opened to the whole world of the Internet in the form of a wiki. Anybody
is invited to share books, either uploading them entirely by scanning all their pages or only by
offering to lend the book to any other person that might need it.
After reading this, you may wonder what the difference between Guttenberg Project and Open
Library. This quotation gives us the answer to this question:
Project Gutenberg is a place to download and read thousands of free ebooks. Open
Library's goal is to list every book -- whether in-print or out-of-print, available at a bookstore or a
library, scanned or typed in as text. In other words, we provide access to all of Project
Gutenberg's books but we have hundreds of thousands of others as well.
Europeana
7
https://openlibrary.org/
It is an open online library which comprises not only books but also multimedia files such
as videos, audios or artworks produced in different European nationalities. It can be useful if you
need to find out cultural and historical documents for your TFG or even in your future research.
Once logged in, you can find a very interesting project of digitalisation, consisting of
transcribing already scanned documents for easy later recovery 8. A great amount of digitalised
manuscripts can also be found http://tinyurl.com/yd9bwjm5 . Each image can be magnified so
that you can perceive some details.
8
https://transcribathon.com/en/
Luminarium 9
It is one of the pioneer "digital libraries" on the Internet specialised in English Studies. It
comprises a complete anthology of work English Literature from Middle Ages to the Restoration
period. It is based on a very detailed set of links for each author. Apart from full-texts, their author's
bibliographies and some essays, you can also find a project called Encyclopaedia, created "to
provide historical contexts for the people, places, and events featured in Luminarium."
9
http://www.luminarium.org/
Activity 1.5 Knowing other libraries and databases
Visit some other University libraries and look for the electronic sources that they offer to their
users. Try to consult other databases that could be of interest for you (not available at UNED).
You can find below some of them, to begin with:
http://biblioteca.ugr.es/pages/biblioteca_electronica/index (Universidad de Granada)
https://www.open.ac.uk/library/library-resources (Open University)
http://bib.us.es/nuestras_colecciones/recursos-e/index-ides-idweb.html (Universidad de Sevilla)
https://www.uab.cat/web/libraries-1345738247610.html (Universidad Autónoma de
Barcelona)
https://www.lboro.ac.uk/library/ (** visit this link http://tinyurl.com/yyq4uxhn if you are
participating in our Innovation Network to know more things about it by talking to their users)
You can also visit a library near the place where you live. Remember that you can use any of the
public libraries to consult e-documents (if the institution is paying for it). Consider even the
possibility to bring your own computer to the library to download articles to your computer or
transfer them to a memory stick.
All you have to do is look for "full-text" articles, click "download" to save them in your memory
drive.
Part II. Web syndication as a research tool
You may have seen a little orange icon in many web pages and you might wonder what it is for.
If you haven't, try to locate the following image next time you visit newspapers or blogs online.
This Is an example:
https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/index.html
.
Web syndication is a form of syndication [arrangement] in which website

material is made available to multiple other sites. Most commonly, web
syndication refers to making web feeds available from a site in order to
Here you are the view of provide other people with a summary or update of the website's recently
different RSS subscriptions added content (for example, the latest news or forum posts). The term can
through Thunderbird also be used to describe other kinds of licensing website content so that
(http://www.mozilla.org/es- other websites can use it. (Wikipedia, English Version).
ES/thunderbird/ ):
This video will help you understand better the concept of RSS:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU. You can read more
with books from Safari Online (Sabin-Wilson & Mullenweg, 2014),
although, It Is Important to know that RSS feeds are being so extended
as before.
This is done by adding XML code (Extensible Makeable Language) that

readers can use. Readers are alerted automatically thanks to RSS (Really
simple Syndication) technique. The following graphic summarises the
running of these kinds of tools:
Page
updating
Web/blog XML
user RSS
To read these updatings, you will need to use a tool called aggregator,
although some email applications such as Thunderbird or Outlook already
permit this option. Feedly is an example of the aggregator to receive this
sort of messages. This video shows how to use it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=No-3uHejTIs
If you click on the icon, you will generate a URL, in this case:
http://rss.proquest.com.ezproxy.uned.es/rss?rss_id=987296 . If you add
the URL generated to a feeds aggregator, you will receive a message
every time something new is published in the journal, blog, the magazine
you follow.
Activity 1.6 Aggregators & Feeds (Optional)

You will distinguish the new
content thanks to the orange Create an account at Feedly or any other agregator. Go through some of
indicator. the mentioned sites and try to subscribe some RSS of your interest You
can also try with Dialnet, Gutemberg Project or the Spanish MInistry of
Education. Create your own categories so that organise your feeds and
try to visualise them through different views. Alternatively, you can use your email application to
try to receive RSS alerts along with your emails.
Comment your experience in the forum (unit 1).
Question bank
This group contains tests to study the contents of the first unit of this course
https://www.goconqr.com/es-ES/groups/38516/show_study_aids You can also create more
tests even from your mobile phone or your tablet. You can apply to join In the link mentioned
before. Please, let me know If you have any doubt with them. Applications might have
experienced some changes and updatings In the last years.
Unit 1 Twitter List
https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei / #unit1_apps_tic_ei
WordPress (Unit 1)
https://wordpress.com/post/mjordano2013.wordpress.com/553
To sum up…
After reading this unit, you may feel overwhelmed with so much information about
databases, e-journals and open libraries to search for information. The important thing of all this
is having a wide idea of all the resources that we have at our disposal before beginning any
research. You do not have to use them all, but at least knowing that they exist in the case you
need them in the future.
Final questions
- Comment in the forum until what extent you have learnt something useful in this unit.
- Would you use any of the databases and other tools to elaborate your TFG? Which of them?
End of Unit 1 Questionnaire
After this, do not forget to fill up this end of the unit questionnaire to improve it in the future.
http://tinyurl.com/hs7d6um
Bibliography
Cohen, S. M. (2004). RSS. Computers in libraries: Complete coverage of library information

technology, (2)
Croft, W. B., Metzler, D., & Strohman, T. (2010). Search engines: Information retrieval in
practice (International ed.). Boston: Addison-Wesley.
Dunning, Ted ; Friedman, E. (Ed.). (2014). Time Series Databases: New Ways to Store and
Access Data: ProQuest Tech Books. Sebastopol, USA: O’Reilly Media.
Manning, C. D., Raghavan, P., & Schütze, H. (2008). Introduction to information retrieval.
New York: Cambridge University Press.
Løkse, M., Låg, T., Solberg, M., Andreassen, H. N., & Stenersen, M. (2017). Teaching
information literacy in higher education : effective teaching and active learning.
Cambridge (USA).
Ruthve, I., & Kelly, D. (2011). Interactive information seeking behavior and retrieval, 296.
You will find more updated bibliography in the virtual course. This year we will use Mendeley
to keep our bibliography up-to-date.
For a more accurate list of bibliographic reference, visit or Mendeley group, Unit 1 at
https://www.mendeley.com/library/
Unit 2. Bibliographic Management Applications 1
Last update Oct 21st, 2019
Unit 2. Bibliographic management applications

Table of contents
Brainstorming ............................................................................................................................ 2
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2
Concept of Bibliographic management applications (BMA) ...................................................... 2
Main elements of a BMA ........................................................................................................... 2
1. Adding new references to your BMA ............................................................................. 3
2. Managing data ................................................................................................................... 3
3. Generating bibliographic references automatically ....................................................... 3
BMA Typology ........................................................................................................................... 4
Commercial BMAs ................................................................................................................. 4
Open source BMAs ............................................................................................................. 15
Conclusions ............................................................................................................................. 16
To know more... ....................................................................................................................... 16
Final open questions ............................................................................................................... 16
Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 16
Brainstorming
Answer and discuss the following questions in the forum opened for unit 2. There will be a
thread devoted to this topic.
 When you need to add additional references or cited works to an assignment, how do
you do it?
 Do you copy and paste the bibliographic reference from the article /database to your
essay or you use any other method?
 Have you ever used any tool to keep your selected bibliography?
 Do you know the existence of tools to help you manage your bibliographic references?
Introduction
The contents dealt in this unit will be related to the third competence included in the area
of information described at DigComp (2017): Managing data, information and digital content. This
competence is crucial to be able to locate previously saved information easily. We will work with
bibliographic references in opposition to unit 4, focused on managing data retrieved from research
processes.
We live in the Digital Age, and thousands of publications are being written every day
about every single topic. Being up-to-date is becoming more and more difficult every time we
need to dig into some specific topic in detail. This is one of the reasons why new tools began to
arise some years ago to help to collect and manage bibliographic references. If the first
applications were thought to be used by trained personnel from libraries and documentation
services, the new versions are being optimised to be used in different platforms and devices.
Some of them add the possibility to work in a group to share and create bibliographic databases
collaboratively.
Concept of Bibliographic management applications (BMA)
Also known as Reference Managing Software (RMS) they are those tools that allow
creating, organising and managing bibliographic references so that they can be easily
retrieved in later searches. Additionally, they allow creating lists of bibliographic references
presented attending to different standards.
Main elements of a BMA
Although some of the functions commented here will be hard to understand before
knowing how to use these applications, having a general idea of their options will help to
understand how they work each of them later. As you can see in the picture below, each of the
elements shown here corresponds to the basic aims of the BMAs.
Adding new data

1 • From Database, e-journals, rss, ISBN, RIS files, etc.
Managing data
2 • Creating folders, adding tags, commenting entries, searching data, etc.
Generating bibliography
3 • Directly from the private database, using the embeded cites in a text document, etc.
1. Adding new references to your BMA
Once we have decided what BMA to choose from the applications explained in the following
section of this chapter, we will be able to import new references following four different ways:
- Manually, by typing one by one all the fields of the bibliographic reference.
- Directly, by transferring the citation reference to your BMA from the source with just a click. This
can be done through a complement or extension downloaded and installed in your browser.
- Indirectly, saving the citation information in a file before being imported using formats such as
TXT, XML, RIS format or BibTeX etc. Each tool works better with some of these extensions or
even has its own standard. Make sure you know this information before importing references to
our BMA. These extensions can also be used to migrate references from one tool to another.
- Other methods: accessing directly from your BMA to external library catalogues, RSS, etc. (e.g.
RefWorks) or extracting bibliographic information from a pdf file.
2. Managing data
While you are adding new references to your BMA, these can be easily catalogued by
adding tags, putting them in their right folders, or even adding notes and commentaries to the
new entry or body of the article (e.g. Mendeley). Also, you can configure your application to save
your references in a specific standard by default (e. MLA, APA, Chicago, etc.). Keeping a
minimum order from the beginning is vital if we want to do our best from these applications, not
only thinking in our interest but if we want to share our references with someone else.
3. Generating bibliographic references automatically
One of most gratifying functions of these applications is the possibility to create

bibliographies in a different style with a mouse click. Normally, these tools already include a
list of the most common citation systems which are automatically updated when a new version
appears. Additionally, you can adapt those already included to other aims and add your own
styles to follow some special guideline required by a journal. Once the list has been generated, a
final revision by the author is recommended to be able to correct some possible errors in the final
output.
Directly from the application
If the application allows is, this method is the easiest way to obtain a quick list from a single folder
or selecting the citations that you need one by one. As mentioned before, they use the provided
standards by default, and even some of them allow to add your own ones or even modify some
of their elements. We will have the chance to learn how to do this with RefWorks later in this unit.
Using a Word Processor
Although the later versions of Word Processor like Microsoft Word already include this
function by default, some MBAs offer the possibility to download and adding a macro to your Word
Processor so that you can access to your references every time you need it. Thanks to it, you will
be able to insert cites while writing so that you can be fully concentrated on composing a good
piece of work. You need to open the "Revise" section to see these options:
Once finished, you can obtain that whole list of cited references, alphabetically ordered,
with just a click. Each macro works differently so that we will have to learn how to use our
selection. We will learn how to do this later.
BMA Typology
Now that we have a clearer idea of the potential of these tools, we will concentrate on two
of them to learn how to use them. If some authors divided these applications into three types:
classics, web-based and social networks aimed, some years later, they can be reduced to two
modalities: open source and commercial software. Nowadays, most of them have a web-based
version and allow to share references easily. We will focus first on the commercial ones, because
these are the pioneers, to move finally to the open-source BMAs, which are more varied and
accessible because you do not have to pay.
Commercial BMAs
Nowadays, there are two main BMAs: EndNote (one of the pioneers in this field), and
RefWorks, available at UNED if we use the Institutional email to create an account. If you do it
with the first version, you can continue within your account even after your graduation.
EndNote (mixed)
Developed by Thomson Reuters, it is one leading BMAs nowadays. Along with its Version X9,
which can be tried for free for 30 days, this is a basic free version, completely online. This chart
http://tinyurl.com/y47f9t23 compare the functions included in the full one, being some of them
included in the basic version.
RefWorks
It is one of the BMAs most widely used by researchers and academics, along with
EndNote. It has been receiving a rapid increase of users since its foundation in 2001. One of its
advantages is that it permits the direct exportation of several references at the same time from
several databases and online resources. This can be due to the fact that a product developed by
ProQuest Research Solutions Team, being this company the provider of many products by
Consorcio Madroño. Although it launched a new version two years ago, Flow, it has not been
available at UNED until 2019. This version presents a friendlier interface, although some of the
legacy edition functions have been replaced by others. This blog post explains how to create an
account at the new RefWorks: http://investigauned.uned.es/proquest-refworks-novedades-en-
el-gestor-bibliografico/
The image below shows the most important elements of RefWorks as seen in "Normal
view". You can change this view to others like "table view", "Full view" or "Citation view" to check
that there are no missing fields or typos. The main features have been marked with a number:
1. References. Pay attention to the name of the author, the title and source. The name
of the publisher is written in the capital letter, and it must not appear so. You make changes by
clicking on one of the entries, which will be coloured blue and it will show at its right all the fields
to complete or modify. Each reference can appear In two folders at the same time. Observe how
each reference has a unique number. Make sure you do not have two titles with a different ID,
which means you have duplicated references in your database. Most BMAs can detect these
references automatically so that you do not have repeated entries. You can also add keywords
to the references so that it can be easier to locate them later. Some of them are already included
when the reference Is imported.
2. Folders. They are located on the left of the entries. The number in parenthesis shows
how many references are contained in each folder. If you click the three buttons at the right of the
folder, will be able to edit it, share it or adding sub-folders. One of the most relevant features of
RefWorks (not included in others) is that you can create a bibliography of folder with a click. You
can also copy and paste isolated references to any document in a formatted way.
RefWorks offers the possibility to install an extension to grab web references or to insert
in-text cites in your Microsoft Word document while writing (tools). This is its appearance, once
installed in your Word Processor.
One of the strongest points of RefWorks is the possibility of adding long lists of references
from databases such as ExLibris or Dialnet. All you have to do Is selecting al the refences you
need and send them to your RW account with direct export option provided by the site. The image
shows how to select items. Then, you will need to click on the pin to move to the next step.
Remember to select the new version of RW:

Once there, they will be saved in the last imported folder, so that you will have to move them later
to your desired fold.
Activity 2.1. Managing your RefWorks database
Open an account at RefWorks https://refworks.proquest.com/library/all/.
Create two or three folders for some of your topics of your interest.
Add some references to the folders created using ExLibris or Dialnet (remember that you need to
be registered at Dialnet to be able to select and export references to your RefWorks folders) using the direct
exportation.
You will find more information about how to manage your bibliography with RefWorks Here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzmTj_AGeY59VoNv-0SvcCg
Mendeley (mixed)
Mendeley's website defines it as "a free reference manager and academic social network
that can help you organise your research, collaborate with others online, and discover the latest
research". Its commercial version is the "Mendeley Institutional Edition", with Premium features
such as the possibility to create private groups with 100 members instead of 3, among others
included in this comparative chart https://www.elsevier.com/solutions/mendeley/Mendeley-
Institutional-Edition.
If RefWorks is one of the best BMA to import several references at the same time and convert
them into lists of references with a mouse click, one of the strongest points of Mendeley is its
collaboration potential and the possibilities to comment on the body of the article (pdf version). It
is flexible, accessible from different platforms and devices and showing a fresh, friendly interface.
These are some of the main features of Mendeley:
Web Importer
Thanks to this browser extension, you can incorporate different types of resources to your
database (books, websites, reports, articles, etc). Observe that you can add the selected resource
directly into a specific group/s and folder/s at a time (1). Before saving your record, you can edit
the fields of the captured reference or even complete the information with more specific data (2).
You can download this extension from the web and add it the different browsers:
https://www.mendeley.com/reference-management/web-importer#id_1
Groups
It is the other most important function provided by Mendeley. You can create three different kinds
of groups with the free version:
- Private groups (a limited number of members can join). A maximum of 5 groups can be created.
You will need to find another proprietary of the group if you need to create a new private group.
- Invite-only groups (users need to ask permission to be accepted),
- Open groups (unlimited number of members). In-text PDF annotations cannot be shared its
members, only the general comments.
The image below shows the desktop version of our group, which is, at the same time, an example
of an open group. Observe how the group contains five folders, one per each unit. If you select
one of the references contained in one of these folders, you will see all the information related to
the item on the right display, which, in this case, includes a PDF with the full text at the end
(attached by the person who added it, María Jordano). In the case, you open groups each user
will need to attach the full-text article once downloaded in his/her computer to see it there for
further readings or annotations.
This group can also be acceded online by typing https://www.mendeley.com/community/aplicaciones-

de-las-tic-en-los-estudios-ingleses/ or visiting your library section:
As it can be seen, the view is not so friendly as the desktop version, but It is useful to access
from anywhere.
Once you create a group, you cannot modify the type of group it is, but you can delete taking into
account that all its references will remain in your desktop. To incorporate new members, you can
add the emails of the users that you would need to add of just providing the link for others to
subscribe (Membership).
You can also ask to join other specialised groups, which have been already created by another
users.
Adding references
Although you can do this action from the web-based site, using the desktop version is easier. Do
not forget to synchronise your database after all to see your changes in the Web Importer. All
your insertions can be done to your library (only you can find your references), or to a particular
group /folder.
Apart from adding references manually (1), there are other methods to incorporate new
references to your database, most of them share by other BMAs:
- Indirectly (2), importing files in different bibliographic formats. These are the most common
bibliographic formats used nowadays, as mentioned in at RefWorks help:
Bibliographic Software (EndNote, Reference Manager, ProCite) Saves the database in a tagged format that can import
into another bibliographic management program. It is the format sometimes called the RIS Format or Reference Manager
Format and can be imported into Reference Manager, ProCite, EndNote, or any other program that supports the RIS
Format.
BibTeX – Ref ID Saves the database in the file format for use with the LaTeX document preparation system.
Citation List Creates a list to use when writing your paper offline. The format includes the RefID, Authors Primary, Title
Primary, and Publication Year only.
RefWorks Tagged Format Saves the database in a format similar to the bibliographic management software format. This
is a tagged format. The data layout, however, is patterned after the RefWorks database as opposed to tags that match
with other bibliographic programs. Use this format for backup purposes and for sharing data with other RefWorks users.
RefWorks XML Format Saves the data in an XML version of the RefWorks Tagged Format.
Tab Delimited Saves all your data in an organized manner with each field separated by a tab. It may then be loaded into
other programs that are designed to read this type of format.
Thanks to the indirect export, we can import several references at the same time in an automatic
way.
- Adding file/s. In pdf format (3). Apart from using the options below, you can also click and drag
the files from the folder on your PC.
3
1
- The direct method, using the Web Importer mainly, described before. Although, on many
occasions, you can also find this option in journals such us Cambridge Journals or Science Direct,
in the same way you find RefWorks icon to export directly.
Adding in-cites and generating bibliographies
Although there is no way to creating bibliographies from the folders contained in your Mendeley
database, there are other options which can help you ease your labour as well:
- In the case of single references, copy and pasting using the right button on your mouse /
Formatted citation would be enough:
Once you do that, you will get the reference in you desired output (APA in this case) by pressing Ctrl+V:
MacMillan, D. (2012). Mendeley: Teaching Scholarly Communication and Collaboration Through Social
Networking. Library Management, 33(8/9), 561-569. https://doi.org/10.1108/01435121211279902
- If you need to write a whole article, essay or work, using the Microsoft Word macro would be
the easiest option. To do this, we click on "References" so that we can see the following
buttons. Once there, you can insert cites whenever you need (1) and generate the list of cited
references once you have finished with your text (2) as explained in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATkcC9609bQ. We will go back to this point in unit 5 when
focusing on academic styles and formatting papers.
This method facilitates your collaborate work in the sense that you can use group bibliographies
to write an essay with no much effort.
Migrating bibliographic references from RefWorks to Mendeley
One of the advantages of BMAs is the possibility to migrate references from one tools to another.
To do this, we need to export the saved references to a some of the provided formats in order to
be imported later by the desired BMA.
RIS
XML,
BibTex
Choose one of your RefWorks folders and export it to a bibliographic format (RIS is the best
option) The, save it in your computer and to be retrieved later from Mendeley.
Once you have located the folder where you would like to Import the references from RefWorks
or you have created a new one, open the desktop application, go to Add Files and choose the
RIS file to import.
After this, observe how all the references from your RefWorks folder are now in your
Mendeley folder as well. It is time now to make your changes, attaching pdfs to comment, etc.
Similar processes must be followed if you need to migrate your references from other MBAs to
others, creating security backups, etc.
Now that you have an idea of how to work with both programs, choosing one or another
is up to you. You can also work with RefWorks to manage great amounts of references and
migrated a specialised selection to Mendeley if you want to annotate them or share them within
the same group.
Activity 2.2 Managing your references at Mendeley
1. Register at Mendeley
2. Download Mendeley Desktop https://www.mendeley.com/download-desktop/
3. Create a folder at "My Library" called "TFG" (or with any other name).
4. Open a new tag with your RefWorks account, create another folder named TFG and collect
different references from the library related to a topic that you would like to deal in your TFG.
5. Export the references to RIS format and import it from the Mendeley desktop version.
6. Add some reference using the web Importer or adding a pdf and do some annotations on it.
7. Visit our group to have a look at the references suggested for units 1 & 2. There are two ways
of accessing (Please, make sure you do not delete anything, If you do it delete some reference/s,
it will be deleted it for the rest of the group):
If you want to add some reference, please add only references related to the topics of the
units. You can save others in your own library or in other groups related.
Remember to share your experience directly on Mendeley group or aLF.
Open source BMAs
Zotero
It is one of the widest spread open source applications to manage bibliographic

references although its interface has remained the same in the last year, while Mendeley
continues evolving. It shares with Mendeley its aim to be designed to work in collaboration and
importance of its browser extension to retrieve data from the web. A group was created some
time ago to try this tool, but it has not been very successful This is the link, if you want to have a
look: https://www.zotero.org/groups/230232/aplicaciones_tic_en_los_estudios_ingleses). It is
still open if you want to go around. It also works for Linux and Mac OS and it has a quite active
community https://forums.zotero.org/discussions
You can find extra functions such as the attachment tool that allows you to obtain
screenshots from websites and add them to the citation, the possibility to have the web and
application opened at the same time, including folders, you own database, etc.
Conclusions
After reading this chapter, you will probably have your mind a complete idea about these
tools, when to use them and how. All of them are very effective tools and will optimise your work
every time you use them although you will need plenty of time to choose the best option.
To know more...
Our blog https://wordpress.com/view/mjordano2013.wordpress.com (Unit 2)
Twitter List https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-2
Final open questions
After having read this unit, comment if you found useful enough the tools introduced here and
if you consider that they could be used in your future research works.
- Have you found this unit extremely difficult to follow?
- Do you think you could use any of the tools seen in this unit in your TFG?
- In that case, which one would you prefer?
Bibliography
Mendeley: https://www.mendeley.com/library/
Unit 3. Tools for Communities of Practice (CoP) 1
Nov 22nd 2019
Unit 3. Tools for Communities of Practice (CoP)

Table of contents
Initial questionnaire ................................................................................................................... 2

Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2
Communities of Practice (CoPs) and professional fora ............................................................ 2
For teachers and researchers ............................................................................................... 3
Examples of CoP designed for students of foreign languages ............................................. 7
Tools to create CoPs ................................................................................................................. 9
Asynchronous Computer-Mediated Communication tools (ACMC) .................................... 11
Synchronous CMC tools (SCMC)........................................................................................ 23
Final Questions........................................................................................................................ 28
Conclusions ............................................................................................................................. 28
To know more .......................................................................................................................... 28
Bibliographic references .......................................................................................................... 28
Brainstorming
Unit 3 As an ice-breaker activity to start this unit, begin by answering these questions
in the thread opened for this aim in the course forum.
You can fill up this
questionnaire from • Do you know what a Community of Practice is?
• Have you ever felt part of one of them?
your mobile phone
• Do you think it is essential to belong to one of them to study a specific
as well…
topic?
• Have you ever had any bad experience with any of them?
Initial questionnaire
Before studying this unit, please, submit the following survey:

http://tinyurl.com/ydh772lo
Introduction
We have explored in the previous unit how bibliographic management

applications can help us make the process of gathering and updating our list of
references an easier task to do. However, we are not alone. Being able to work
collaboratively is an extremely important competence nowadays if we want to
improve our work. We have already seen some referencing tools ready to work
in groups, but in this unit, we will go even further. Having said this,
COMMUNICATION becomes a crucial element in everyday life. Most of the
contents of this unit correspond to most of the descriptors included in the
DigComp 2.1 competence 2.4 Collaborating through digital technologies, which
states “To use digital tools and technologies for collaborative processes, and for
co-construction and co-creation of resources and knowledge” (Ferrari, 2013).
We will begin by revising the concept of Community of Practice (CoP)

and some of its direct applications.
Communities of Practice (CoPs) and professional fora
According to Wenger (1998), one of the pioneers in the study of the

Communities of practice, these are described as groups of people who share a
concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they
interact regularly.
Three main elements are inherent to any CoP:
 The domain: A community of practice is not merely a club of friends or a

network of connections among people. It has an identity defined by a shared
domain of interest.
 The community: In pursuing their interest in their domain, members are engaged in everyday
activities and discussions, help each other and share information. They build relationships that
enable them to learn from each other.
 The practice: A community of practice is not merely a community of interest--people who like
certain kinds of movies, for instance. Members of a community of practice are practitioners. They
develop a shared repertoire of resources: experiences, stories, tools, and ways of addressing
recurring problems— in short, a shared practice.
Communities of Practice are not new at all, and they are not exclusively related
to learning contexts. They have existed for ages with the added value of having become virtual in
the last two decades. They began by using BBS (Bulletin Board System), consisting of sending
messages to an online board to ask questions to other members of the community, share opinions
about a particular topic, etc. The first communities were made of people suffering any illness that
made contact to try to obtain relief to their pains. As time went by, these boards became
distribution lists, and later became more sophisticated fora with tools to upload files, image, deliver
polls, etc., for example, Yahoo Groups.
Some examples of CoPs related to Language Studies
Before exploring some tools to create your own communities, knowing some of them
related to the field of English Studies could be interesting. For this reason, we will begin by
describing some of the most relevant ones focused on the teachers and researchers to continuing
by mentioning other centred on the students of languages.
For teachers and researchers
The Internet has meant a giant step for those who work with technology to teach /research
any topic. Some of them began with a simple distribution list and nowadays they have been
transformed into Social Networks with different dedicated elements. They experience pitch and
down periods depending on the issues dealt, most of its members have a meeting point whenever
they need to share an enquiry, ask any doubt or to find a clue to start with some incipient research.
Some of these communities are formed professional associations with a presence in different
social networks to spread their publications, events, communications, etc.
Webheads.
It is one of the most active CoPs, integrated by more than 1000 language teachers from
all over the world, who search for new ways of teaching through technology. They built their first
CoP with a Yahoo Group (http://tinyurl.com/yxasbl69 ), but, unfortunately, this platform will
cease its activity eventually by the end of 2019 and has had to migrate to an alternative site
https://groups.io/g/webheadsinaction. They have a long tradition of organising open virtual
courses online for language teachers on the most relevant and innovative topics all around the
world. This is the case of Electronic Village Online, which started “as a TESOL Special Project of
the CALL Interest Section in 1999 and was founded in 2000 by Christine Bauer-Ramazani, Tom
Robb, and Susan Gaer”. You can subscribe its newsletter here: http://pbworks.us3.list-
manage.com/subscribe?u=4269e8c899d3893e5ba113427&id=3e3932b2dc.
All of their online events are listed here:

http://evosessions.pbworks.com/w/page/10708564/EVO%20Previous%20Sessions .
Almost two decades later, Webheads keeps on being one of the most active and
determined CoPs in the world of CALL. Its members acknowledge that their expertise has
increased thanks to the collective knowledge gained in this CoP. It could be a perfect example of
CoP. They have a quite respected leader with a reputation that inspires confidence. All the topics
dealt in the community are perfectly reliable, and practice is evident. It is one of the best places
to grow professionally in the art of teaching languages with technology at the same time it can
provide you will students to promote exchanges and innovation programs. You can also follow
the activity of its member through LinkedIn group https://www.linkedin.com/groups/95403.
AEDEAN (Spanish Association for English and American Studies)
In the same way as AESLA, it organises an annual event in Spain. It also has its own
distribution list, which can only subscribe if you are an active member. This association cover the
following areas:
Comparative Literature, Critical Theory, Cultural Studies, Feminist and Gender Studies, Film
Studies, Historical Linguistics, Language Teaching and Acquisition, Lexis, Medieval and
Renaissance Studies, Modern and Contemporary Literature, New Technologies, Phonetics and
Phonology, Postcolonial Studies, Pragmatics and Discourse Analysis, Short Story,
Sociolinguistics & Dialectology, Syntax, Translation Studies & US Studies
Articles related to these topics can be found in ATLANTIS, Journal of the Spanish Association for
Anglo-American Studies. You can read all its articles at this link:
https://www.atlantisjournal.org/index.php?journal=atlantis&page=issue&op=archive.
Additionally, they publish semesterly a magazine named Nexus. All its pdf-issues can be read
openly though this link https://aedean.org/?page_id=141
This association is connected to The European Society for the Study of English (ESSE) 1 and The
European Association of American Studies (EAAS). Both associations publish their own journals
under the names of The ESSE Messenger European http://essenglish.org/messenger/ Journal
of American Studies http://ejas.revues.org/ All their articles can be read in their full-text version
from the links provided. Along with AEDEAN, all these associations also publish the proceedings
of the conferences they hold every year (two, in the case of EAAS). Some of them can even offer
some grant for students 2
AESLA (Asociación Española de Linguística Aplicada)
Although, in the same way as AESLA, its forum (only for members 3) is extremely moderated,
thanks to its incorporation to several social networks, their members are becoming more active,
so that their information is spreading more efficiently. Their specialized panels cover areas closer
to linguistic than cultural or literature matters, like in the case of AEDEAN. RESLA Revista
Española de Lingüística Aplicada/Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics (RESLA/SJAL) is the
name of its publication, and it can be acceded through this URL:
https://benjamins.com/#catalog/journals/resla/main Its topics coincides with the specialised
panels of the association. You can read some of its articles in full-text version through the library:
https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.uned.es/publication/1936344 (2011-13) / https://search-
proquest-com.ezproxy.uned.es/publication/2036309 (2014-present). Remember that you can
follow updates via RSS with ProQuest. You can read more information in Dialnet
https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/revista?codigo=1727
Take note of these profiles so that you can visit them later in this unit:
Twitter: @aesla_twit / Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aeslaweb / LinkedIn

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/AESLA-4450901
TESOL (International Association of English to Speakers of Other Languages)
Although it is based in the United States, this association has members and local delegations
all around the world, for instance, TESOL-Spain. The Interest sections (ISs) of this associations
included: Adult Education; Applied Linguistics; Bilingual Education; Computer-Assisted Language
Learning; Elementary Education; English as a Foreign Language; English for Specific Purposes;
1
RSS http://www.essenglish.org/calls.xml / @essenglish
2
http://www.eaas.eu/eaas-grants/travel-grants
3
http://www.aesla.org.es/es/lista-distribucion
Higher Education; Intercultural Communication; Intensive English Programs; International

Teaching Assistants; Materials Writers; Non-native English Speakers in TESOL; Program
Administration; Refugee Concerns; Second Language Writing; Secondary Schools; Social
Responsibility; Speech, Pronunciation, and Listening; Teacher Education; Video and Digital
Media. These topics are dealt in its publications: TESOL- Journal 4, TESOL Quarterly 5 and
specialised books. Unfortunately, our library is not subscribed to these publications, but you can
follow the activity of this organisation thanks to its RSS
http://newsmanager.commpartners.com/tesolc/rss-intro.php and presence in several social
networks:
Twitter: @TESOL_Assn / Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tesol.assn / / LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/company/tesol-international-association
IATEFL (International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language)
If TESOL International is one of the most representatives English Teachers associations in the
United States and other parts of the world, its equivalent in the European continent is IATEFL. Its
annual conventions are held at different points distributed throughout all the UK, in the same way,
TESOL International do the same with their conferences. Its Special Interest Groups also have
their own events within and outside the general convention. These are Learner Autonomy;
Learning Technologies; Literature; Pronunciation; Research; Teacher Development; Testing,
Evaluation & Assessment and Young Learner and Teenagers among others. One of the most
actives SIG is LTSIG. You can follow its activities through RSS: https://ltsig.iatefl.org/feed/ Twitter:
@ iatefl_ltsig or Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LTSIG/?fref=ts (more than 3000
members)
You can know more about IATEFL in its YouTube Channel:

https://www.youtube.com/user/IATEFLtalks
EuroCALL & CALICO
4
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1949-3533/issues
5
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1545-7249
EuroCALL “is a professional association dedicated to language learning and teaching with new
technologies. It holds an annual conference in a European country”.
Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC); Corpus; Joint Virtual Worlds and Serious Games;
Mobile Assisted Language Learning; Intelligent CALL; CALL Teacher Education; Graduate;
Social Network Presence: Twitter: @EurocallLang; LinkedIn group:
http://www.linkedin.com/groups/EUROCALL-710067; Facebook group:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/255577856335/ It also has a distribution list, but it is only for
members.
RECALL is the name of its publication, and it can be read in its full-text version from 2001 through
the library: https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.uned.es/publication/43616
It is the CALL association based in the United States. SIGs: CMC; Gaming; Graduate students;
ICALL; TLLT; Teacher Education; Teacher Training & SLAT are its SIGs, and all of them have a
place in its journal, CALICO Journal. Some of its articles can be read in the full-text version for
free: https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/CALICO/issue/archive You can receive feeds
alerts vía RSS https://api.equinoxpub.com/issues/CALICO/current.rss
Examples of CoP designed for students of foreign languages
Web 2.0 has been considered an efficient and easy way to use tools to create an
environment where one can exchange impressions and ideas with people from all over the world.
If traditional pen-friends used the discussion to exchange letters in the foreign language, this new
environment has made possible the emergence of several spaces to practice any language freely
and in an easier way. Here you can find some examples:
Busuu (http://www.busuu.com ) is a CoP based on Video Chat to practice foreign

languages. Its name comes from a language in Camerun spoken by just 80 people. The free
version includes Flash cards, writing exercises and correction from native speakers.
Its mobile apps have been awarded twice in the IOS and Android version.
The Mixxer
The Mixxer (http://www.language-exchanges.org/). It is a community that uses a VoIP

client to practice languages (English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, etc... You need to specify
a group to practice when joining for the first time.
What began as a small project to help Professor Meguro at Dickinson College find
Japanese partners for her students has expanded to 30 - 40,000 active users per month
around the world. The site is free and open to anyone looking to practice with a native
speaker in exchange for help with their own. Once registered, users can search for
speaking partners via the Profile Search or submit a short writing piece and ask for
corrections from native speakers. Those using the writing function are asked to return
the favour by correcting short samples in their native language. Our guidelines are very
simple. Members are here to practice a language (this is an educational site, not a dating
site), and they agree to be respectful and courteous to all users at all times. Welcome to
our community where everyone is both teacher and learner.
Activity 3.1. CoP related to language learning
Did you know any of the communities described in this section? Have you ever
used any of them to practice your English skills or any other language? Comment your
experience in the forum.
Tools to create CoPs
If you could go through some of the CoP mentioned before, you would realise
that most of them began a long time ago, being just a website to teach and learn
languages. Others were so old, that already existed even before the existence of the
Internet.
Now that we have an idea of what a CoP is, we will introduce some of the most
used Computed Mediated Communication (CMC) tools existing on the Internet to help
you create your own CoP either with your students in the classroom or with other working
colleagues. This image shows the most important hits in the history of communication:
Asynchronous Computer-Mediated Communication tools (ACMC)
ACMC tools are those used to communicate with time delay, this is, not in real-time.
The first means of communication on the Internet was electronic mail. Distribution lists
permitted to send the same email to different contacts at the same time. BBS (Board Bulletin
systems) displayed thread and long conversations all of a sudden, until blogs appeared,
conceived to write longer paragraphs.
Blogs
Stauffer (2002) described weblogs or blog as
a website that has been designed to be updated with items in a linear, time-based fashion,
similar to a personal journal or diary, except that the contents are meant specifically for
public consumption.
If the concept of blog emerged as something individual, nowadays they can be

constructed in a collaborative way for leaning, informing or even sharing knowledge with the
Internet community. There are plenty of applications to create blogs (Blogger 6, WordPress 7,
LiveJournal 8, etc.). Their grade on collaboration depends on the options that you wish to activate
during the configuration.
Level 1
Level 2
Only the
author writes, Level 3
comments are Only one
NOT allowed. author writes. There is more Level 4
All the posts
can receive than one Level 5
author, all of Each memeber
comments of the
them must Blog projects.
have their own community
ID in the blog. has his/her
own blog and
all of them
share the
same blogroll.
Examples:
Level 2. Howard Gardner Blog https://howardgardner.com/ It is the blog of one of the

most widely known specialists on Education, famous for his theory of multiple intelligences (see
how you can receive RSS notifications).
6
http://www.blogger.com
7
http://www.wordpress.com
8
http://www.livejournal.com/
These two blogs were developed by UNED students for a Master subject.
Level 3. Blogs Lingüísticos para docentes artísticos.

blogcolaborativo20142015uned.wordpress.com (a collaborative blog to learn and show how to
build a blog with WordPress in opposition to Blogger)
Level 3. Shakespeare conoce a Cervantes: http://tinyurl.com/yd45fsjj (A blog built among

different teams of students to explore Shakespeare & Cervantes scope in their 400th anniversary)
When building a weblog with WordPress, having an idea of the sort of profiles available is crucial.
This chart summarises it:
Receiv Send Write/edit Write/ Moderate Publish Customise

e comments their own edit comments posts appearance
update posts other
s posts
Viewer x
Follower x x
Contributor x x x
Author x x x x
Editor x x x x x x
Administrator x x x x x x x
For more information: https://en.support.wordpress.com/user-roles/
A WordPress blog on this subject was created some years ago. It has been enriched by the
teaching team, tutor and students at some stages. WP allows you to re-blog post from other blogs
so that sharing other WP contents is quite easy. Feel free to collaborate with some entry or
improvement. This is the link: https://wordpress.com/view/mjordano2013.wordpress.com The
idea is to comment on novelties added by some of the tools included in the contents of this subject.
Once you open an account at WordPress, you can also use it as a reader of other blogs,
search information in all WP Blogs, etc.
Microblogging
Although it emerged just a few years ago, this tiny tool has revolutionised the world of
Information. Nowadays, Twitter is one of most widespread social networks either for the general
and specialised public. Although it cannot be considered as a synchronous tool, it is so active and
quick, that sometimes it can be confused with an IM application.
To understand how it works, we need to know the concept of these terms:
Tweet; # Hashtag; Lists; Follower; Following; Interact; @Connect; Re-twit; Trending

topics; moment;
Lists are quite useful when you follow users keeping some order. In the case of this
subject, there has been created one list per unit. If we visit some of these lists, we will
find:
- Name of the list (1)
- Number of the member (people/institution followed in that list) (2)
- Number of subscribers to that list, mostly “you” (3)
- Other lists owned by this profile (4)
- Tweets sent by the members of the list (5)
- Recently added members (6)
If you want to subscribe this list, click on https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-3/members and

apply for it.
Lists are quite useful when you follow users keeping some order. In the case of this subject,
there has been created one list per unit. If we visit some of these lists, we will find:
- Name of the list (1)
- Number of the member (people/institution followed in that list) (2)
- Number of subscribers to that list, mostly “you” (3)
- Other lists owned by this profile (4)

- Tweets sent by the members of the list (5)
- Recently added members (6)
5
1
2 3
6
If you want to subscribe to this list, click on https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-3/members

and apply for it.
Remember that our Twitter profile is being used to re-tweet messages of your interest, inform
about events related to this subject, etc.
You can use these hashtags when referring to specific units:
#unit1_apps_tic_ei
#unit2_apps_tic_ei
#unit3_apps_tic_ei
#unit4_apps_tic_ei
#unit5_apps_tic_ei
Activity 3.2 First steps with Twitter (or not)
0. Open a Twitter account, if you don't have it.
1. Follow our Twitter account @apps_tic_ei, and some of the CoPs mentioned so far in
this course.
2. Subscribe the list of unit 3 https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-3
3. Use our hashtag for unit 3 to re-tweet some tweet related to this unit,
#unit3_apps_tic_ei
** Read more about how to use hashtags here: https://support.twitter.com/articles/49309
4. Read some of these hashtags: #CIEB2019 #iatefl #webinars #eltevents or #libraries

#SIMOEDU19 and comment on your experience in the forum
** You can also subscribe our course lists below:
Unit 1 https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-1
(The rest will be found throughout this course)
Wikis
Perhaps one of the best definitions of a wiki could be found in the Wikipedia, the most
famous wiki on the Internet. It describes a wiki as a “a website which allows its users to add,
modify, or delete its content via a web browser usually using a simplified markup language
or a rich-text editor”.
Given that technologically speaking a wiki is a website comprised of by different HTML

pages, some elements are basic to facilitate the edition of content. For this reason, we find
these three elements in each page:
1. Edit functions. Thanks to this function, all the members of the wiki can edit all the
contents of the page easily. In some cases, like Wikipedia, these editions can be
moderated for security reasons.
2. Discussion. This is a space aimed to debate on some possible conflicts and perspectives
of the topics dealt in each page.
3. History of editions. All of the changes, mainly based on editions and insertions, can be
tracked through this function
The following wiki has been created with MediaWiki, the same application used for
Wikipedia. This image shows the different elements of a wiki:
There are different tools to create wikis, for example, PhpWiki8, PBWorks9. You will find
similar tools here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_wiki_software. aLF could integrate a
wiki in the course or community and Microsoft Teams as well.
Social networks with academic and professional aims
Most of the CoP mentioned before using Social Networks as a means of

communication among its members at the same time they can generate knowledge. Danah
and Nicol (2007) define social network websites as:
web-based services that allow individuals to (1) construct a public or semi-public

profile within a bounded system, (2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share
a connection, and (3) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others
within the system.
The nature and nomenclature of these connections may vary from website to website. This
is probably the best way to transfer and generate knowledge nowadays. There are many
classifications of social networks on the internet. This illustration represents one of them attending
to their interests and type of conversation generated:
We explore some of the most useful Social Networks for our aims, attending to the audience
towards that are addressed: general, professional or academic:
• General use / purposes
We will focus on Social Networks, which, although designed for other purposes different to
the strictly academic or professional ones, there are networks like Twitter (already described) or
Facebook which are being used as the main way of spreading information among its CoP
members.
Facebook
Founded in 2004 by a group of undergraduate students 9, It is by far the most extended social
network. It has more than 500 million followers. The associations described before are using
individual profiles, groups and websites to share their knowledge. Let us see some of the
differences and functions:
- Individual profile. It mostly reserved for people. You can find plenty of interesting information
following relevant academics like Elizabeth Hanson-Smith, Agnes Kukulska-Hulme or any
other of your interest.
- Groups. These can be “closed”-only members can see posts-, “public”, or “secret” (only
members can find the group in the directory). Some examples of CoP who uses this option
are LTSIG, CALICO, New Webheads Online Community, IATEFL TTed SIG, WorldCALL
Lounge, WikiEducator, EuroCALL.
- Pages. Its appearance is not very difference from individual profiles, but one of its
advantages is that one profile can have more than one pages with different topics. Some
examples of pages can be seen on AESLA, AELFE (European Association of Languages
for Specific Purposes), TESOL-Spain, TESOL-International, and many others.
9
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1285016/
- Events, very useful for announcing conferences and getting an approximate number of
attendants, either if they are online or face-to-face.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LTLTsig/
Office 365 Teams
As you already know, the fact of being registered at UNED Campus, you have a whole
range of applications at your disposal. If you access your email account and then click on “Office
365”, you will see these applications ready to use for free:
Thanks to this application, you can maintain real-time conversations, arrange meetings,
record them or sharing files. Each Team can also include different channels with their own
conversation threads, files spaces, etc. This application can be used via web, desktop or installing
an app in a mobile device. It allows you to make phone calls even to external phones. All the files
shared in the channel can be edited by all the members of the Teams using the web, desktop or
local application (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.). All the files can be synchronized with your own
PC so that you can work locally if needed. Teams aims to supply the use of email and VoIP
systems like Skype. All the members of an institution can be included in Teams. To invite external
users, that need to have Office 365 in their institution and be accepted by the ITs of the host
platform.
You can access to Teams through the icon located on aLF or following this link
https://teams.microsoft.com/
Google groups
It is a service offered by Google to allow communication among its members. It can be used
through this link: https://groups.google.com/ and its appearance are quite straightforward:
The picture shown above belongs to the users' group of a corpus tool named AntCord:
https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!forum/antconc. New groups can be created from
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!overview. They could be displayed in different ways:
To create one of these groups you need to have a Gmail account but not to be added.
They can be private or be visible to everyone to subscribe.
• Professional Social Networks
After the emergence of Social Networks for general aims, other ones were created more
focus on spreading information and contacts at a professional level.
LinkedIn
It is one of the most widely known and used all by most of the CoP described at the beginning
of this unit. It was officially launched in 2003, and nowadays it is leading the professional networks
on the Internet with more than 530 million users in more than 200 countries. Although its most
famous feature is finding jobs, it is used by some of its members to set up debates on specific
topics, announce events or looking for professional and academic contact. In the same way as
Facebook, you have some kind of wall, or “state” where you can share information, and you can
create groups of members to share common interests (https://www.linkedin.com/groups/). This
list shows some groups related to our field (see how they contain some debates on avant-garde
topics:
- Comparative and Historical Linguistics https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1831758/profile

(2.892 members)
- Natural Language Processing People https://www.linkedin.com/groups/131222/profile
(26.447 members)
- Metacognition: "Learning to Learn" https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1790369/profile
(10,002 members)
Once you are in the group, everyone is very similar to most social networks: you can create your
own conversations, or “like”, “comment” and share other messages. One of the added functions
of LinkedIn is the possibility to add articles and presentations, apart from writing short messages.
As you can see in the image below, you can make lists, edit fonts or include links and images.
It is very useful if you are seeking a job or want to keep in touch with contacts related to
your professional context. In that same way it happens with Facebook, its management becomes
simpler if you access through its mobile app.
Activity 3.3 Facebook & LinkedIn
Before going on with other sorts of networks, we recommend you visiting some of the
Facebook & LinkedIn websites so that you can get a closer idea of how these CoPs make use
of these applications. In the case you do not have an account on these social networks, you can
try observing the following CoPs:
1.Linguist list http://www.linguistlist.org/ (Not really a CoP but a distribution list, keeping
the same interface since its foundation in 1990).
2.The literature Network http://www.online-literature.com/forums/forum.php (BBS
interface, observe that you can follow interactions through RSS).
Pay attention to their frequency of publications and obtain your own conclusions. You
can share your opinions on the forum.
• Academic social networks
We are living the era of Information, where being visible academically speaking, is crucial if
you want to grow and be “someone” in a scientific context. On the other hand, miles of articles
and books are published every day about different disciplines, so that knowing what is being
published about your topic everywhere is becoming more and more impossible. This is the reason
why networks of this nature have suffered a high increase in the last decade. We have already
seen the social face of tools like Mendeley. We have had the opportunity to enrich our own
collaborative bibliography at the same time we add and receive some comments on some of the
references that we have shared. If part of aims of Mendeley is providing its users with a space to
share their own findings, and, why not, their own publications, other tools like Academia or
Research Gate has been specially designed to expand investigations and connect researchers
with close interests.
Research Gate
It is an academic, social network specialised in spreading scientific production of its more

than 14 million members. Its creation was quite expected, but casual at the same time:
ResearchGate 10 began when two researchers discovered first-hand that working with a
friend or colleague based on the other side of the world was no easy task. The rapid
evolution of technology has opened the door to change; by providing you with the right
tools, we strive to facilitate scientific collaboration on a global scale.
It works very similarly to other social networks. Given that one of the aims of this network is
spreading your research, once you created an account you will be asked to search your
publications automatically so that they can be added to your profile (CV). Then, you can add more
publications manually. It does not mind if you do not have any publication to share. You can skip
that step and begin to follow other researchers of your interest. Every time they publish something
new you will receive a notification in the case you want to read it or share it, follow it, comment it
10
https://www.researchgate.net
or just keep it for further reading. Most publications are grouped by projects so that you can locate
and follow researchers or your interest through their publications. Additionally, this tool provides
you with statistics of your visits and citations, in the case you have something published. Although
most publications can be read in the full-text version, there are others of which only the reference
and abstract is shown. You can write its author a private message so that you can be sent the
full-text version.
This menu shows the basic functions of Research Gate:
“Questions” sections are inquiries sent by different users to find a solution to some problem,
asking for some help about some research topic, etc. “Jobs” are also displayed every day in
relation to your CV and areas of interest dropped in your profile. The “bell” show you the most
important updates and activities generated in your profile. The envelope leads you to your
private messages, and the blue button allows you to add new papers, articles, conference
communications, etc.
Complementary options can be added, such as “projects” and “labs”. The first word refers to
research project as such or to a collection of publications related to shared topic. The second
one has been thought for a group of academics who works collaboratively in one other more
projects. All the register users can follow publications, projects, questions, etc. They can also
share other users’ publications or recommend them publicly.
o Academia.edu
It is quite similar to Research Gate, with more than 103 million researchers subscribed.
“The company's mission is to accelerate the world's research”. Once accepted, you will receive
an alert every time someone searches your name on your publications in Google. More than 23
million papers have been linked to more than 1 million research interests.
Once you publish your work, will receive alerts in your email box, every time it is quoted,
or read, etc. There are Premium options that need to be paid to be used, but the basic package
is enough to spread and follow your topics of interest.
As a summary, this graph shows the use of Academia and Research Gate among
nowadays researchers:
Image taken from https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/do-academic-social-

networks-share-academics-interests
Activity 3.4 Research Gate & Academia (Optional)
Given that these two social networks can provide you with more bibliography on topics of
your interest, create an account in one of them and share your experiences on the forum. Try to
follow papers and project related to of area/s of interest.
Synchronous CMC tools (SCMC)
Synchronous communication is described as the communication processes or channels

where participants interact by communicating at the same time, in contrast to asynchronous
communication or deferred communication. This technology has been improving with the passing
of years so that the quality of the sound and image acquired nowadays is quite good, which
permits a better environment to maintain online meetings and other sorts of events.
Instant Messaging (IM) VoIP
It is a way of communication over the Internet, which offers an instantaneous transmission

of voice messages from sender to receiver. Most of them add the possibility to include video to
the conversation so that face-to-face meetings are being replaced by this sort of technology,
characterised by increasing the quality of the calls.
Skype (for Business) & Teams chat
Skype has become one of the most valued VoIP tool thanks to its quality sound and
reliability. Although you need to pay to speak from phone to phone, it is entirely free if it is used
to communicate via PC. It can also be installed on mobile devices with good results. Among other
functionalities, there is a possibility to create groups of speakers, sharing the desktop with other
users, recording conversations, etc. It was acquired by Microsoft recently so that it has been
integrated into some of its products. Thanks to this transaction, the users of Office 365 can enjoy
a better quality of sound, image and additional functions with the “Skype for business”. This
application lets you add up to 250 users to the same conversation, when the basic one permitted
a maximum of ten. To use it, you need to install a different application to the basic Skype:
https://portal.office.com/account#installs
One of the most important advantages of this version is that you can search all the
members of your institution in your directory and even add others from other institutions if you
know their ID. All UNED members will appear with their UNED user ID. (e.g.
mrodriguezxxx@alumno.uned.es). You can also record meetings and share desks.
All in all, due to the effort that Microsoft is doing to promote Teams, it is quite probable
that Skype for Business could be replaced by Teams (chat) in the future. It is important to know
that there is no need to belong to any Team to chat with individual users. To call someone, open
Teams and click on the chat icon. Type the complete name of the person you want to talk to and
wait for a response. You can use text, voice or video. All the conversations can be recorded and
saved in Streams 11 by default.
Activity 3.5 Practice with Teams to chat
Install Teams for Desktop in your computer or the app in your mobile device and try to maintain
a voice conversation with any other student or the teaching team (María Jordano). You can also
try the web version (https://login.microsoftonline.com/) if you don’t want to install it.
Share your experience in the forum.
Mobile apps
In a world with more mobile phones per citizen than PCs, synchronously written communication
led by desktop IM has been replaced by mobile apps like WhatsApp, Facebook IM, Telegram or
Viber.
11
Streams is video application, very similar to You Tube, which can be used either privately or publicly.
https://web.microsoftstream.com/.
Whatsapp
WhatsApp? 12 is one of the most common mobile IM version. Last versions allow to create
groups and distribution lists, send voice messages, share locations and send the chatlog to an
email account so that it can be saved for later analysis of discussion if needed. Each group can
manage pictures, links and other documents so that they can be exported to other tools. It can
also be installed in a computer from links like this: https://download.cnet.com/WhatsApp-for-
PC/3000-2150_4-76640933.html.
Webinars
Webinars are "virtual" seminars. The term "webinar" was firstly mentioned by Eric R. Kolb
in 1998 to describe the online meeting service his company developed. They are synchronous,
real-time online conference events that gather people together at a given moment to listen to,
observe, and participate in a presentation. They began as video conference tools to be used in a
room prepared for that aim. New webinar tools are based on constructivist learning theories,
which can hold seminar sessions with collaborative new ways of learning.
This link contains a list of videoconferencing tools and a comparison of their main
features:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_conferencing_software.
As you can see, most of them require a proprietary license except for cases like
BigBlueButton 13, which is part of Mozilla’s Open Innovation program. Most of these webinar tools
share similar features: voice and text chat, different profiles to attend the conference -as a guest,
12
http://www.whatsapp.com/
13
http://www.bigbluebutton.org/
presenter, administrator-, record the whole session, display documents, etc.
Blackboard Collaborate
It is an IMS company that bought recently two of the most widely used webinar tools, Elluminate 14
and Wimba (initially IM for e-learning environments). The result is the combination of interface and
technology of both of them. It includes options for moderation, group creation, recording, etc. using
voice mainly. It could be integrated within multiple platforms, even mobile ones and LMS as well.
Its 12th version has the following appearance:
http://www.brainshark.com/blackboardinc/vu?pi=zHBzur4jMz35Sgz0 . You could also download a
demo version here to try it: http://try.bbcollaborate.com/trial/register.go
Adobe Connect 15
You may have seen it in any of the webinars organised by MacMillan or RefWorks. This
link shows the functionalities of its latest version:
https://www.adobe.com/products/adobeconnect.html
AVIP (UNED)
This platform has been developed by UNED to deliver its tutorships in a synchronous
environment. It could be used either with an interactive blackboard, as an alternative to the
traditional board, from any computer via Internet. The presenter give his/her talk at the same time
the slides of the presentation can be passed when needed. The presenter can also answer
questions vía text or voice or even make use of a blackboard to enrich the explanations.
AVIP has improved its interface at the same time is has changed its technology, from
Java to HTML5, which is more frienlier and easy to use. It also allows to share the desktop,
something quite important in a subject like this.
14
http://www.elluminate.com/Products/International/?id=201
15
http://www.adobe.com/products/adobeconnect.html
As it can be seen above, the interface changes a little bit from the live session to the recorded one.
Google Hangout
It is one of the options available from the Google+ platform to broadcast events, organise simple
videoconferences, record your own videos (although you should be aware that they are stored on
YouTube, etc. It comes to replace the former Google talk and it can be opened through this link:
https://hangouts.google.com/
Thanks to this tool, it is possible to share the desktop with your audience, create groups, use if
you’re a mobile phone, etc. You can begin to talk at any time but you can also arrange a meeting
in Google Calendar to hold it there at a fixed time.
To know more about this tool, you can watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2-
tsGelk4U
Final Questions
Now that we have finished this unit, we encourage you to answer these questions in the thread
created to that aim in the forum for unit 3.
What do you think about this unit? Did you already you know the tools presented? Have you learnt
anything new?
Do you consider now a key point to work in collaboration in order to study any single topic?
Do you feel yourself as a part of a CoP -UNED students- after having taken part at UNED virtual
courses as an active member? Do you have any sense of community after these four years?
Conclusions
We have only seen a small sample of the panorama which the Internet can offer nowadays to
work in collaboration.
The next unit will explore some of the most important research software applications to make our
work more consistent and reliable.
To know more
Twitter list https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-3
Blog (Unit 3 category): https://wordpress.com/stats/day/mjordano2013.wordpress.com
Mendeley https://www.mendeley.com/groups/2403831/aplicaciones-de-las-tic-en-los-estudios-
ingleses/ (Install the desktop version on your PC to go to Unit 3 references)
GoConqr https://www.goconqr.com/es-ES/groups/38516/show_study_aids (It is a quite good

collection of mind maps and other resources to revise contents but take into account that some
of the things that appear there could not be included in the contents of this unit)
Bibliographic references
Bibliographic references
Ferrari, A. (2013). Digital Competence in Practice: An Analysis of Frameworks. Joint Research

Centre of the European Commission. https://doi.org/10.2791/82116
Stauffer, T. (2002). Blog on : the essential guide to building dynamic weblogs. McGraw-
Hill/Osborne.
Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. Cambridge

University Press. New York: Cambridge University Press.
https://doi.org/10.2277/0521663636
Find more at: https://www.mendeley.com/library/

Unit 4. Web 2.0 and other emerging technologies 1
applied to research
Last update Nov 23th 2018
Unit 4. Web 2.0 and other emerging technologies applied to research
Table of contents
Brainstorming ............................................................................................................................ 2
Learning Results........................................................................................................................ 2
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2
Visualisation of information ....................................................................................................... 3
Data collection ........................................................................................................................... 9
Tools to improve the retrieval and analysis of data ............................................................... 9
To know more... ....................................................................................................................... 25
applied to research
Brainstorming
Please, dedicate some minutes to think about these questions. Then, share your
answers in the forum.
- When you need to write an assignment, do you do everything from scratch? Do

you do it on paper?
- Have you ever done a concept map to study?
- Have you ever created an online questionnaire?
- Do you take notes when you need to write an essay? How do you do it? Do you
use a notebook? Post-its?
Learning Results
By the end of this unit, you will be able to:
- Plan a research project individually and in collaboration with others.
- Identify the most important tools to collect and analyse data to perform qualitative
research.
- Identify the most important tools to collect and analyse data to perform quantitative
research.
Introduction
Now that we know where to locate information save it (Competence area 1) and
communicate with others to spread and make it flow (Competence area 2), it is time to
create contents (Competence area 3), based on collected data. This graph summarises
the main points seen up to this point of the course so that you can understand better
what follows.
applied to research
Unit 1
Databases,
Unit 2
Journals,
RefWorks to manage
Unit 3
RSS, bibliographic references
ebooks, individualy, etc. CoPs to share our knowledge,
Direct exports, Lists of learn from each other, being
etc. up-to-date, etc.
bibliographic references
automatically, etc. Social Networks as the
Mendeley, to work in group, evolution of fora & distribution
lists.
Easy pdf annotation, etc.
Scope of Twitter, Research
Gate & Academia to spread the
word.
This unit will be focussed in two main areas:
- Planning a project /research, with the help of visual representations,

- Resources to gather and analyse data (quantitative, mainly based on statistics and
numbers; qualitative, based on more subjective methods: opinions, description of
processes, etc.)
To study the first area, we will use tools to build mind maps and concept maps, among
other tools on a computer, tablet or mobile phone. Some of the applications dealt in this
unit could seem difficult to understand, but the aim of it is acquiring a general idea of the
existence of these tools in the case we can need them in the future. As an example, we
will learn how to elaborate and deliver your own questionnaires online or take multimedia
notes about information to be included and analysed in your TFG.
Before continuing with this unit, it would be good to read the sixth chapter of a book
entitled Doing a Research Project in English Studies : A guide for students (Buckingham,
2015) for a better understanding of the concepts included in this unit. This resource can
be read online at the library.
Visualisation of information
Probably, at this point, most of you will already have created one of the maps we
are going to explore in detail using your hand or some computer application. It is
something that you can use in your classroom to present a general perspective of some
unit to your students, learn vocabulary or take note of spontaneous ideas to be included
in an academic essay.
Before beginning to write any work, it is crucial to have a general idea of what would you
like to do and how. This is the reason why a good brainstorming from the beginning is
applied to research
so important before conducting any research. As you can see, there are different
techniques to visualise information as shown in the illustration below.
A mindmap is hierarchical and shows relationships among pieces of the whole.

It is often created around a single concept, drawn as an image in the centre of a blank
page, to which associated representations of ideas such as images, words and parts of
words are added. Major ideas are connected directly to the central concept, and other
ideas branch out from those. (Chuck Frey, 2016a)
A concept map is a top-down diagram showing the relationships between

concepts, including cross-connections among concepts, and their manifestations.
(Eppler, 2006, based on J.D.Novak).
A conceptual diagram is a systematic depiction of an abstract concept in pre-

defined category boxes with specified relationships, typically based on a theory or mode
(Eppler, 2006).
applied to research
A visual metaphor is a graphic structure that uses the shape and elements of a
familiar natural or manmade artefact or of an easily recognisable activity or story to
organise content meaningfully and use the associations with the metaphor to convey
additional meaning about the content (Eppler, 2006).
These representations are also used to analyse relationships between members

of a community, through messages exchanged in a forum, a social network, etc.
(Rettberg, 2013). This section will introduce some of the most relevant applications to
create this sort of representations. We will focus on mind maps. (You can read more
about the difference between Concept maps and mind maps here (Chuck Frey, 2016b),
although it is “Infographics” one of the latest terms used to define the new ways of visual
representation (Becerra D., Muñoz A., Núñez-Lagos B., Rebollo J., 2016).
Mind Manager
Mind Manager 1 was the first tool designed by Mindjet to create concept and mind
maps, -depending on the mode that you select from the beginnings:
It can be integrated into different Office applications, generate a pdf, synchronise

with mobile gadgets, etc. It also allows capturing information from the web to be
organised later with the possibility of synchronising with your mobile device, something
somewhat useful if you need to take notes when travelling or you do not have your PC
with you. The extension of the files created with this tool is .mm and, in the same way, it
1
http://www.mindjet.com/products/
applied to research
happened with BMAs, you can also import and export from some formats to another to
migrate elements.
FreeMind
It is an open source tool that allows creating mind maps. It is very similar to the
previous one, but with fewer functionalities. However, it allows exporting to many
extensions (HTML, pdf, word, .rft, etc.). It is written in Java, but it has no possibility of
synchronising with tablets. It can only be installed on PCs.
This is one of the mind maps generated by FreeMind 2:
On the left, you can find plenty of icons that can be added to the nodes while you
are working. At the bottom, you can add notes for each node. From “Archive” you can
export and import different extensions.
2
http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
applied to research
CMapTools
It is another example of free software. It allows connections between published concept

maps but requires Cmap Server. This is the front page of the CMapTools’ 3 website:
One of the main characteristics of CMapTools is that you can share and elaborate
your maps in collaboration with other users. After completing your registration here
http://cmap.ihmc.us/download/, you can use it freely.
It can be used at an IPad by downloading and installing this app

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cmaptools/id927987108?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D4
GoConqr
Apart from all these tools, we can find the possibility to create straightforward maps as
an option of some authoring tools like GoConqr. This map shows a classification of some
CoP tools. Some of them are not included in the contents of this course, although it has
been created by some of the students enrolled.
3
http://cmap.ihmc.us/
applied to research
Additionally, this company has just launched a new tool to create flowcharts
https://www.goconqr.com/en/flowchart-maker/ A flowchart processor cycle can also be
described regarding an outline, so long as the outline indicates the progression of steps
either forwards, backwards or looping (PennState, n.d.)
You will find plenty of examples in our workshop: https://www.goconqr.com/es-

ES/groups/40658/show_study_aids Also some video tutorials to learn how to use them.
There is also an app to be installed on your mobile phone, which is quite easy to use.
This map was created by one of the students of this subject, and it summarises all the
elements of this unit: https://www.goconqr.com/en/p/7132250
You will find other free and proprietary tools here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_concept_mapping_software
Activity 4.1 Creating maps with GoConqr
Go through some of the maps created for this unit and leave your comments to some
of them. You can also suggest your own map for this or any other topic.
https://www.goconqr.com/es-ES/groups/38516/show_study_aids
Remember that you can use your mobile device as well to do this with an app either for
IOS and Android.
applied to research
Data collection
Before processing with the study of this section, you may be interested in this
MOOC https://iedra.uned.es/courses/course-v1:UNED+FDCD_AlmBas_03+2018/info,
as a preliminary introduction to different kinds of data, and how to keep them
depending on their format.
Tools to improve the retrieval and analysis of data
Now that we know what to do and how to do it, it is time to collect data, to be able
to analyse it later. As we mentioned, to achieve this, we have two options: following
statistical methods (qualitative research) or conducting research based on more
subjective techniques (interviews, observation, etc.).
1. Reading specialised
literature
4b. Way to collect data 2. The selection of

(qualititave bibliographic references
/quantitative) is ready
3. We have been
4a. We have a general
consulting different
idea of what to do (Mind
CoPs for additional
maps)
information
Although data can be obtained through other methods, not so mediated by

technology, it is important to be aware of the existence of these tools in order to be more
efficient in your work while they help you save time in the whole process. All the tools
described here can be applied to other contexts different to those related to research as
such. They can be very useful:
o to analyze the needs of your teaching environment (in order to improve

your teaching quality),
o To design the syllabus of a new subject,
o To elaborate your TFG,
o To plan a collaborative project at work,
o To study “oposiciones”,
o To write articles,
o Etc.
applied to research
Either if we opt for carrying on qualitative or quantitative research, we will explore two
sorts of tools. The first one aims to collect data, and the second ones to study the data
retrieved, as shown in the graph below:
• Questionnaires
• Observation notes Notes
• Interviews,
Collecting • Copora,
data • etc
• QACDAS
• Spreadsheets
• Statistics suits
Analising data
I Qualitative research
Before studying the tools related to this section of the course, we need to revise
the basic elements and modalities of this type of investigation. This methodology entails
collecting primarily textual data and examining it using interpretive analysis (Heigham &
Croker, 2009). So, the main way to collect data is by creating questionnaires (mostly
open), preparing interviews, observing the process to be analysed, etc.
The following chart shows the main features of the five approaches/ varieties of
qualitative research 4:
4
You will find a bigger image of this table in the virtual course.
applied to research
Now that we have made an idea of the implications of the qualitative research, it
is time to explore some tools that will help us manage with this sort of data. Some of
them have been specially designed to compile and analyse qualitative data (Atlas.ti,
NVivo), which are known by the acronym of QUAQDAS (Computer Assisted Qualitative
Data AnalysiS). Others are applications which have been created for other users, but
they are enormously useful for qualitative purposes (Evernote, Audacity, Excel, etc.).
a) Qualitative research software for obtaining data
The tools described is this section will help us in the process of gathering
information coming from the main instruments used in qualitative research: observation,
questionnaires and interviews.
Observation
It is another technique that can be used to gather data for your qualitative
research. You can just take some notes while you watch, or record everything for later
study.
Some years ago, the only way to record notes for a research project was by taking
notes of everything you observed by hand. Now, thanks to 2.0 there are tools specially
designed to save multimedia notes. Although one of the pioneer ones was Evernote,
inspired in the traditional Post-Its, nowadays even Google (Google Keep) and Microsoft
(OneNote) have launched their own apps.
Most of them share the most basic functions, Creating and sharing text, image
and audio notes, organised in tags and accessible through different platforms and
devices. To focus on just one tool, we will explore Evernote. Click here to watch an
introductory video about this tool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1p_7snQhdLI
Apart from the basic version, you can add complements in your browser, such as
“Clipper” to capture images from the internet and many other things.
Pay attention to this workshop very carefully (recorded two years ago) to know
how to use Evernote can help you with observation and other academic tasks:
http://tinyurl.com/ycy2rcb6 Nevertheless, we will see this and other applications to take
notes on our webinar. You can also read this article to know more about the differences
between Evernote and OneNote:
Vega, C. (2017). Evernote vs OneNote | Feature Comparison | Digital Trends.

Retrieved November 24, 2017, from https://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/evernote-
vs-onenote/
Activity 4.2 Observation tasks with Evernote /OneNote
** You can also use OneNote or Google Keep if you do not want to create a new
account.
applied to research
1st) Create an account in Evernote.
2nd) Open a notebook with the name of this subject.
3rd) Add a note where you will jot down all the things learned from now on in this
unit.
4th) Add the clipper extension to your browser. Watch this tutorial to know how
to use it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7a29RyJNbkU
5th) Download the desktop app & mobile app and synchronise your notes.
** If you do not want to create a new account, you can try with OneNote (Office
365) https://login.microsoftonline.com or Google Keep
https://www.google.com/keep/
Comment your experience in the forum suggesting the possible uses that you
may have found it.
Designing questionnaires
Questionnaires are any written instruments that present respondents with a

series of questions or statements to which they are to react either by writing out their
answers or selecting from among existing answers (Brown, 2001). The reading of the
third chapter of this book would be highly recommended before continuing:
Brown, J. D. (2015). Introducing Needs Analysis and English for Specific Purposes.
Florence, United States: Taylor and Francis. https://ebookcentral-proquest-
com.ezproxy.uned.es/lib/unedbiblioteca-
ebooks/reader.action?docID=4332718&ppg=64
Although we have introduced questionnaires in qualitative research, they could

be applied to mixed methods or even pure quantitative research to be analysed
statistically. If we want to design good qualitative questionnaires, the ideal would be to
leave most items as open questions, but it is more efficient to make use of Likert scale 5
methods or even true-false items. If you are interested in elaborating a good
questionnaire for applied linguistics purposes, this book (Dörnyei, 2007) will be of great
help.
5
A Likert scale is a psychological measurement device that is used to gauge attitudes,
values, and opinions. It functions by having a person complete a questionnaire that
requires them to indicate the extent to which they agree or disagree with a series of
statements.
applied to research
Traditionally these tools were elaborated and delivered on paper so that they
could be processed with a machine (if available) or manually. Nowadays, there are plenty
of tools to create online forms that you can download from the Internet for free or as a
demo with some restrictions. For many years SurveyMonkey 6 or Zoomerang 7 have been
the main options. However, most of these applications were not free, had some
limitations of use and show a high amount of publicity while submitting. Another option
was using an HTML editor like FrontPage 8 or Dreamweaver 9, but the first of them
became obsolete some years ago and the second one required installation and paying
a license. This is the reason why many users are using Google Form, included in the
cloud storage system known as Google Drive. It is easy to create, deliver and complete,
using even your mobile device). These online office applications offer the possibility of
working entirely online without the need to install anything on your computer. In the case
of smartphones or tablets, this can be a very suitable option if you need to access your
information from different points. Therefore, Google forms offer different views:
- Editing view (to create your form, even in a collaborative way).

- View form, the final version ready to be sent to your respondents.
- Responses summary (including automatic percentages and graphs).
- Spreadsheet view (downloadable into your PC in different formats).
This video tutorial will show you how to create and deliver your own form
https://youtu.be/gwOw61CxxMM
You can also create forms using Office 365. Just go to your Office 365 and open
the tool to create them: https://forms.office.com .Once there, you will need to think of
a title, add different questions and share the resultant URL so that other students can
access to complete it. Only UNED members can fill it up by default, but you can
customise it so that others can access as well. This video shows how to create and
manage Microsoft Forms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvWQXYl_aV0
6
http://es.surveymonkey.com/
7
http://www.zoomerang.com/
8
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/frontpage-help/about-creating-forms-in-frontpage-2003-
HP005281248.aspx
9
http://www.adobepress.com/articles/article.asp?p=1332862
applied to research
Activity 4.3 Creating online questionnaires with Google Forms /Microsoft

Forms
Think about questions that you would like to ask your course mates about a topic of
your interest. Then, create a five-item questionnaire and launch it to the whole group
so that they could fill it out. You can also share the results with some of them if you
do not mind.
Try to include one question following the "Likert scale". Know more about this here:
http://study.com/academy/lesson/likert-scale-definition-examples-analysis.html
Remember to use Google Drive form option to this. This video tutorial will show you
how to do it: https://youtu.be/gwOw61CxxMM
Don't forget to share your experience in the forum.
Interviews
Another way of collecting data in a qualitative study is by interviewing the

participants. Dörnyei distinguishes different types of interview, depending on the
number of participants involved, the structure and its purposes (Dörnyei, 2007). In
many occasions, these interviews are recorded and processed for later analysis. If you
need some help with the transcriptions of the dialogues, you can make use of
specialised software, which will be seen by the end of this section.
Tools to record conversations
At this point, we can have two different sceneries: face-to-face interviews &
meetings held on the Internet through VoIP or another kind of SCMC. In the first case,
the most usual method of recording would be a mobile device or a camera, if gestures
are relevant in our study. Recordings on the Internet offer different solutions:
- Using the operative system recorder (included by default in most

computers).
- Using the Webinar option, if this is the chosen environment.
- Installing programs to edit sound files. This is the case of Audacity (open
source), Soundbooth, or Praat (for phonetic purposes).
- Skype for business already includes this option.

applied to research
Audacity 10
It is one of the most extended tools. It works with many different extensions,
including .wav and .mp3 included, although you will need to download a special plugin
to do this.
The interface is quite friendly, and it permits many options to the user.
Once you have any sound file open, you can cut, copy, paste or edit any
fragment. You need to install a plugin called LAME to convert your files into MP3 from
this URL: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/plugins
You can watch this tutorial https://youtu.be/aCisC3sHneM to know how to use

this application.
As mentioned at the beginning, you can always use your OS sound recorder, but
it will probably have less sound quality, and it does not have the option to edit the sound
recorded in the same way it does Audacity.
Software to transcribe your interviews
Qualitative research methods required to transcribed all your audio data gathered
so that the categorisation can be done in a more precise way. The use of the specialised
software will help us with this task.
Transana 11
10
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/?lang=es
11
http://www.transana.org/
applied to research
It is not only of the widely used tools to do transcriptions but also perform other
qualitative tasks. It identifies analytically interesting clips, assigns keywords to clips,
arranges and rearranges clips, creates complex collections of interrelated clips,
explores relationships between applied keywords, and shares your analysis with
colleagues. The result is a new way to focus on your data and a new way to manage
large collections of video and audio files and clips.
This is a transcription analysed with Transana:
As it can be observed, you can synchronise your data with video too. Thanks to
its last improvements, this tool can be compared to the functionalities of other specialised
software to qualitative studies. Other options to transcribe are for free are:
Transcriber (open source) 12. However, they are not very effective if your aim is
working with non-native speakers of English.
b) Analysing your collected data with CAQDAS (Computer Assisted Qualitative Data
AnalysiS)
Once we have gathered all the data, we will need to categorise it, to analyse it.
As mentioned before, these tools are very close to research matters, and you will
probably don’t have to use them in the rest of your life, but it is good to know that they
exist because they can save you time at the same time, they will add quality to your
studies.
In the case of qualitative research, this sort of software is known as CAQDAS

(Computer Assisted Qualitative Data AnalysiS). In comparison to the software
designed for quantitative studies, they are less in quantity and “younger”, due to the
12
http://trans.sourceforge.net/en/presentation.php
applied to research
most solid tradition in quantitative studies, typical os empirical sciences like Physics,
Maths, etc.
The list of tasks described below (Silver & Lewins, n.d.) have been taking from a book
which explores the three of the most relevant tools to manage and analyse qualitative
data (NVivo, Atlas.ti &MAX.qda):
applied to research
We will focus on two of them, commercial products (NVivo & Atlas.ti), apart from
an additional one, open source software (Digital Replay System).
 NVivo
It is one of the most famous CAQDAS with a proprietary license. It allows working
with the main elements of qualitative research and with multiple formats. Although you
need to pay a high price to use it, there is the possibility to download a 30-day demo 13 if
you want to try it. It also includes a way to work with mixed methods (qualitative &
quantitative) including data from several web 2.0 applications (social networks, Evernote,
Twitter, etc.).
The following screenshot shows some of the elements of NVivo, such as folders,
searching options, nodes, reports, etc.
It also permits to create graphs with data extracted from Twitter and other social
networks:
13
http://www.qsrinternational.com/products_nvivo-server_free-trial-software.aspx
applied to research
You can find some NVivo tutorials for different operative systems in the following
link: http://www.qsrinternational.com/nvivo-learning/nvivo-tutorials
 Atlas.ti
It was first developed by researchers from the University of Berlin as an

interdisciplinary collaborative project between psychologists, computer scientists,
linguists and future users during the years 1989-92. The menu is mainly divided into four
sections: Documents, Quotations, Codes and Memos. Although you need to pay to use
the complete version of this application, the demo can be used for an unlimited time with
the following features:
It is not possible to save projects that exceed a certain size, although you can open
and use projects of any size. Maximum allowable sizes are:
Ten primary documents (of unlimited size)
100 quotations (= data segments)
50 codes
30 memos
applied to research
Ten network views
auto backup is disabled.
Follow the link below to watch a video about the main features of this tool:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PLxTR712LA&feature=youtu.be
New versions are being improved to work collaboratively, in a network, and making
it easy to work with different documents.
Free seminars are shown on the web page to learn how to use this application.
http://atlasti.com/learning-old/free-training/#Free-Webinars
II Quantitative research
This methodology involves collecting primarily numerical data and analysing

statistical methods.
Before dealing with this tools, it is essential to understand the meaning of the following
terms:
-Sample: Group of participants whom the researcher examines in an empirical

investigation. There are different ways to select the sample in order to be as exact as we
can.
- Population: Group of people whom the study is about.
- Type of close-ended items contained in the questionnaires, which might be the majority.
They might be formulated according to the ‘Likert scale’, which take their name from their
creator. They consist of a characteristic statement and respondents are asked to indicate
the extent to which they agree or disagree with it by marking one of the responses
ranging from `strongly agree’ to ‘strongly disagree.' Apart from this type, others may be
included, such as true-false, multiple choice, open-ended questions, etc.
- Hypothesis, described by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as a ‘proposition tentatively

assumed in order to draw out its logical or empirical consequences and test its
consistency with facts that are known or may be determined’.
As we did with the qualitative research, the tools described in this section have been
divided into two parts: 1. applications to collect data and 2 — software to help you in the
process of analysing the results.
applied to research
Collecting data Analysing data
• Close-ended • Excel
quesionnaires • SPSS
• Corpora • PSPP
•R
• MATLAB
a) Quantitative research software for obtaining data
Apart from the questionnaires mentioned before to obtain qualitative data, we can
also obtain data directly from primary texts, measuring some phenomenon objectively
by controlled means (e.g. assessing response time or behavioural frequency)”
(Dörney,2007).
Corpora tools
A corpus is a collection of pieces of language text in electronic form, selected according

to external criteria to represent, (Sinclair, 2005).
In the case of dealing with texts and oral communication, corpora may be of great help.
Although we can have free access to several corpora, we can create our own corpus
with texts gathered by ourselves.
One of the most known corpora tools is WordSmith Tools 14, set up in 1996 by Oxford
University Press and Lexical Analysis Software Ltd. Most corpora software has these
three elements: Concord, keywords, frequency. The following screenshot shows the
steps to set your default configuration.
14
http://www.lexically.net/wordsmith/
applied to research
This program is the one used by Oxford University Press to elaborate their
dictionaries, but it also is being used by language teachers and students, researchers
and translators all over the world. Apart from this, there are other concordancers such
as AntCord14F 15, or Wordcruncher15F 16 although a complete one is WordSmith Tool. If
you visit its user forum, you will get an idea of the potential and functionalities of this tool:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/wordsmithtools
If you are interested in learning how to use corpora in your teaching and research,
these are a MOOC launched at least two times a year:
https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/corpus-linguistics
Activity 4.4 An introduction to the use of corpora
Watch the following video about the use of corpora & statistics in English Studies:
https://canal.uned.es/mmobj/index/id/26544.
Would you like to learn more about corpora? Register this MOOC about Corpora:
#corpusMOOC https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/corpus-linguistics
Comment your impressions in the forum.
15
http://www.antlab.sci.waseda.ac.jp/software.html
16
http://www.wordcruncher.com/wordcruncher/default.htm
applied to research
b) Quantitative research software for managing data
Once you have collected a minimum quantity of data to

To learn how to use SPSS begin our analysis, you may be able to export them either in a direct
applied to languages learning, or indirect way to a statistical program. Web-based tests and
think about Reading this book:
questionnaires usually report their results in CSV format, which can
http://cw.routledge.com/textb be read by any spreadsheet and these, at the same time imported
ooks/9780805861853/ from any statistical program. In the case of Excel, creating a graph
using the data retrieved from a questionnaire is quite easy.
SPSS is probably the most famous statistical package, but it

requires a proprietary license. If your institution has not paid for it,
you can find other alternatives such as R16F 17, PSPP17F 18 or
MATLAB18F 19.
SPSS.
It is the most common software to perform applied statistics,

although it is presented by its IBM developers as a business
product. It is integrated into a family of products that address the
entire analytical process, from planning to data collection to
analysis, reporting and deployment.
Once it is installed you can add more than 12 functional modules

to improve your research. This is the view of a black document.
This book contains a website

we you can download the keys
to many of the exercises
proposed in the book, links and
figures among man other
things.
---
Watch and download a video

tutorial on SPSS (version 17)
from iTtunesU:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/it
unes-u/spss-learning-
modules/id396781458
PSPP
17
http://www.r-project.org/
18
http://www.gnu.org/software/pspp/
19
http://www.mathworks.co.uk/data-analysis/
applied to research
PSPP is very similar in appearance and functionalities to SPSS. It is being used by

market researchers, psychologists and sociologists. SPSS has a data view tab
(spreadsheet), a variable view tab (to create variables and define their characteristics)
and has an easy to use point-and-click interface. Although primarily a point-and-click
software, PSPP also has a command syntax language.
MATLAB
It works with spreadsheets or traditional programming languages such as C, C++,

or Visual Basic. ‘These products combine a powerful numeric engine and programming
environment with interactive tools for statistical analysis, image processing, signal
processing, and other domains’. Among other features, you can:
- Access data from files, spreadsheets, databases, test equipment, data acquisition
hardware, other software, or the Web.
- Explore your data to identify trends, test hypotheses, and estimate uncertainty.
- Create customised algorithms, visualisations, and models and publish customised

reports.
- Share your analysis tools as MATLAB code or as standalone desktop or Web

applications.
** Remember that you can download it from UNED website previously logged in.
R
applied to research
R is a GNU environment for statistical computing and graphics developed at Bell

Laboratories (formerly AT&T, now Lucent Technologies). It compiles and runs on a wide
variety of UNIX platforms and similar systems (including FreeBSD and Linux), Windows
and MacOS. It has been conceived for pure statistics. The following image shows its Mac
interface:
To know more...
Twitter List https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-4
Google CoP
https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/105656544029775584719/stream/b4d818fd-
39bf-4c83-829c-f7e1b1f477f9
Final questions
Did you find useful the tools to create concept maps? Have you tried any of them? What
was your experience?
Thinking about your Final Degree Assignment, would you prefer to do a qualitative or a
quantitative study?
Did you find any difficulty to understand the last section of this unit?
Bibliography
Becerra D., Muñoz A., Núñez-Lagos B., Rebollo J., S. P. A. (2016). Stats ‹ Apps TIC in
English Studies — WordPress.com. Retrieved November 17, 2016, from
applied to research
https://mjordano2013.wordpress.com/2016/01/16/infographics-english-
studies/?iframe=true&theme_preview=true
Brown, J. D. (2001). Using surveys in language programs. Cambridge Language
Teaching Library., 319 p. BOOK.
Buckingham, L. (2015). Doing a Research Project in English Studies : A guide for
students. Oxford: Taylor and Francis.
Chuck Frey. (2016a). Concept maps vs. mind maps. Retrieved November 17, 2016,
from http://mindmappingsoftwareblog.com/concept-maps-vs-mind-maps/
Chuck Frey. (2016b). Concept maps vs. mind maps.
Dörnyei, Z. (2007). Research Methods in Applied Linguistics. Oxford University Press.
Eppler, M. J. (2006). A comparison between concept maps, mind maps, conceptual
diagrams, and visual metaphors as complementary tools for knowledge
construction and sharing. Information Visualization.
https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ivs.9500131
Heigham, J., & Croker, R. A. (2009). Qualitative research in applied linguistics : a
practical introduction. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
PennState. (n.d.). Accessibility at Penn State | Flowcharts & Concept Maps.
Retrieved November 18, 2016, from http://accessibility.psu.edu/images/flowcharts/
Rettberg, J. W. (2013). Tutorial: How to explore a network graph of electronic literature
in Gephi – jill/txt. Retrieved November 17, 2016, from http://jilltxt.net/?p=3730
Silver, C., & Lewins, A. (n.d.). Using software in qualitative research : a step-by-step
guide.
Unit 5. Revision of software applications: Research and 1
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Unit 5. Revision of software applications: Research and publishing

industry
Brainstorming ............................................................................................................................ 2
Learning results ......................................................................................................................... 2
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2
Manuals of Style ........................................................................................................................ 3
Formatting your paper ........................................................................................................... 3
MLA Style Modern Language Association ............................................................................ 3
APA (American Psychological Association) .......................................................................... 5
Periodical publications for the General Public ......................................................................... 11
Publications on general topics (Newspapers, Magazines, etc.) .......................................... 12
Software developed for Academic /Scientific journals ........................................................ 16
Creating a book/ e-book .......................................................................................................... 18
Internet accessibility and mobility ............................................................................................ 21
To know more about this topic ................................................................................................ 23
Final work / PEC ...................................................................................................................... 23
Final questions ........................................................................................................................ 23
Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 23
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Brainstorming
Have you ever needed to follow any kind of guidelines to write an assignment?
Have you ever created your own publication?
Have you ever tried to create your own e-book?
Have you ever published something on the web considering a minimum of

accessibility?
Learning results
By the end of this unit:
-You will learn the very basic rules to format an academic piece of work and
work with bibliography.
- You will recognise some of the tools to create a magazine or an academic

journal.
- You will know some of the most important applications to create a printed or
electronic book.
Introduction
In the last unit, we have seen how to plan our research work and what kind
of software to use depending on the methodology chosen. We will finish this
course by learning how to format an academic paper according to some
standards, taking our first steps towards the publishing industry.
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1. Reading specialised
literature (Databases)
2. Management of
5. Format and
bibliographic
publication
references
4b. Way to collect 3. CoP for more

data (qualititave specialized
/quantitative) information
4a. We have a general

idea of what to do
(Mind maps)
Manuals of Style
In the field of Humanities, there are two main styles to format academic
papers: MLA and APA. Although the first one was initially thought for Modern
Languages topics and Humanities in general, nowadays, APA is preferred by
journals in the fields of linguistics and Education. MLA is more recommended for
Literature and Anglo-Saxon Culture. This first part of the unit will explore different
ways to format your essay before beginning to write and showing how to cite and
reference your cited works with the help of the applications studied in unit 2.
Formatting your paper
MLA Style Modern Language Association
Apart from being a database to find our references related to Modern

Languages Studies, this organization publishes a book of style to guide academic
writing processes. The first edition dates from 1951, when William Riley Parker,
the executive director at that time, published “The MLA Style Sheet” with the aim
of serving as guide to some of the journals related to the association (MLA
handbook, 2016, p. x). We will try to follow the 8th Edition (2016), which is the
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last one, although Mendeley is still using the 7th Edition. This is why you may find
slight differences among both versions. You can read here the most relevant
changes: https://www.mla.org/MLA-Style/What-s-New-in-the-Eighth-Edition
Most of the publications related to Literature and Linguistics usually

require following the rules contained in the latest edition of the MLA Handbook
for Writers of Research Papers. In it, you will find recommendations dealing
with: font size and type of text and quotes, margins, spacing, title, etc.
The following screenshot shows an example of the first page:
Illustration taken from http://www.ccc.commnet.edu/mla/format.shtml)
As you will find all the measures indicated in “inches”, it is important to remember
that 1 inch is 2.45 centimetres. Apart from this, in the MLA Book of Style and
other related handbooks, you will find information about how to add graphics and
illustrations to your work, when to use capital letters, when to highlight a word, a
revision of the punctuation rules, etc.
You will find more information about how to format your essay here:
https://style.mla.org/formatting-papers/
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APA (American Psychological Association)
This style is commonly used in the area of Applied Linguistics, Psycholinguistics

or Didactics, among other related fields. It is highly recommended to follow the
latest edition of the APA Book of style before beginning to write. You can find the
most relevant changes to the sixth edition in the following link:
http://www.apastyle.org/learn/tutorials/index.aspx If you visit this other link, you
will learn how to prepare your Word Processor to write following the APA
standard: http://www.pasadena.edu/hstutoringlab/apa/paperformat.cfm The
following illustration taken from the same link shows the first page of a sample
paper.
This presentation will show you the most important updates of the 6th edition:
http://flash1r.apa.org/apastyle/whatsnew/index.htm?_ga=2.169091238.6003392
56.1513097954-362338919.1510924913 / It does not work with Chrome,
because it is Flash!! Most of the changes have with how to cite the new electronic
formats which have emerged in the last years.
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Referencing articles, books and websites
You will need to incorporate a list of cited works (bibliography) at the end of
your essay, article or TFG. Before explaining how to create bibliographical lists
automatically with the help of the BMA introduced in unit 2, it is important to know
the elements of the main styles: MLA & APA.
Author: Surname, First name
Title of the source: The name of the work, which may be an article or a book
chapter. It can use quotation marks or italic fonts depending on the style followed.
Keywords are usually written in capital letters.
Title of the container: It is the journal or book where articles and chapters are
found.
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Version: This field is applied mostly to literary works.
Number: It is reserved for journals. Volume/issue or some cases of books.
Publication date: It located at the end in the case of MLA.
Location: It refers to the exact pages in the case of articles or chapter books.
The way of indicating the page numbers varies depending on the source of
references and the chosen style.
Publisher: the company which publishes the book
Editors: These appear in the case of books comprised of several

independent chapters written by different authors. The editors perform a labour
of supervision. They are not the authors of the book.
Date of access: It is sometimes compulsory in the case of websites.
DOI: It is a unique alphanumeric string assigned by a registration agency

(the International DOI Foundation) to identify content and provide a persistent link
to its location on the Internet (APA, n.d.) .
One of the most visual features when formatting bibliographic references is the
“French indentation”, which means that the second lines stars after some spaces.
Book
Buckingham, Louisa. Doing a Research Project in English Studies: A Guide for

Students. Oxford: Taylor and Francis, 2015. (MLA)
Buckingham, L. (2015). Doing a Research Project in English Studies: A Guide for

Students. Oxford: Taylor and Francis. (APA)
Chapter book
Parkinson, Jean. “English for Science and Technology.” The Handbook of English for
Specific Purposes. Ed. Sue Starfield and Brian Partridge. Somerset, NJ, USA:
Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. 177–196. (MLA)
Parkinson, J. (2012). English for Science and Technology. In S. Starfield & B. Paltridge
(Eds.), The Handbook of English for Specific Purposes (pp. 177–196). Somerset,
NJ, USA: Wiley-Blackwell. (APA)
Article
Durán-Escribano, Pilar, and Georgina Cuadrado-Esclapez. “Constitutive Metaphor and

Mental Mappings: Meaning Construction in the Language of Science and
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Technology.” Revista de Lenguas para Fines Específicos 23.1 (2017): 83–107.

(MLA)
Durán-Escribano, P., & Cuadrado-Esclapez, G. (2017). Constitutive metaphor and

mental mappings: meaning construction in the language of science and technology.
Revista de Lenguas Para Fines Específicos, 23(1), 83–107. (APA)
Website
McAdoo, Timothy. “APA Style Blog: References versus Citations.” American

Philological Association. N.p., 2017. Accessed 12 December 2017. (MLA)
McAdoo, T. (2017). APA Style Blog: References versus Citations. Retrieved from
http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/text-citation/ (APA)
Using BMAs to quote and create bibliographic lists of references
Now that you know how to compile references and we already have our
folder of lists ready to be used, it is time to know how to insert them in our text
(e.g. TFG) and how to generate a list of references automatically using one of
these styles.
In-text citations
When you must face the State of Art/background section of your TFG, you will
need to read some articles to be able to justify your topic theoretically. You will
have to quote some authors, and each style has a way to do it. These in-text
citations can be retrieved from a journal, book, or even a website. In any case,
you must know how to cite it conveniently, either with APA (McAdoo, 2017) 1 or
MLA (“In-text citations – The MLA Style Center,” n.d.)2.
If you are using RefWorks, remember to install Write -N- Cite 3 in your computer.
You can watch a video with instructions here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um5oOxJjXAk An additional video can be
found here about how to install and use this tool for Mac users here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZSpx9Q5OV8.
Mendeley users will need to install and open the desktop version. Once
there, go to “Tools” --- MS Installer ---. Given that this complement will be installed
in Microsoft Word, you will need to close it in the case it is open. Once in MS
1
Lee, C.APA Style Blog: In-text citations. Retrieved from http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/text-citation/
2
In-text citations – The MLA Style Center. Retrieved from https://style.mla.org/tag/in-text-citations/
3
http://www.refworks.com/refworks/wncdownload.asp
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Word, go to “References”, choose the style that you need, and insert all the in-
text citations required.
Generating bibliographies
In the case of RefWorks, there are two options:
1. Using Write-N-Cite. Once you have finished the document, a list of cited
reference will be automatically generated with all the in-text citations found
in it. This is the best way to make sure that all the references have been
included in the list.
2. Through the RefWorks website. Just select the folder you would like to
convert into a list of references, choose the style (MLA or APA) and do it.
Watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5mY3yheJ3I You
can choose whether visualise your list on the screen, as HTML or asking
to be sent through email. This is the best way to share lists of references
with other people who do not have RefWorks.
Mendeley does not offer the possibility to generate bibliographies from a folder
so that you must create it from the word processor, once you have inserted all
the citations. Then, click on bibliography and do it.
To change the output of the bibliographic references, to need to do some

changes. In the case of RefWorks, we will find plenty of different styles to choose.
We can even choose one and adapted to the requirements of a journal. To
achieve this screen, you will have to click on Bibliography – Output style Manager
– Several versions of styles can be found so that you can select some of them as
favourites.
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Once done this, you can also change the view of the references in your folders.
In the case of Mendeley, go to View-Citation style – choose the desired style.

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Activity 5.1. Adding bibliographic references to your essays
Use your RefWorks account to create a list of references from one of your folders,
selected references or all of them. Remember to revise that they follow the accurate
format before finishing. You can copy and paste that list or send it as an attachment.
Use Mendeley to insert some in-text citations within a paragraph or more. You
can add more than one author in the same cite. Remember that erase the name
of the author if you do not need it.
Share your experience in the forum and do not forget to ask any doubt or
problem you could have with this.
You can also copy and paste “formatted text” of single references for quick
insertions.
++ You can read this blog post if you want to know more about the different
between “references” and “in-text citations”. McAdoo, T. (2017). APA Style
Blog: References versus Citations. Retrieved from
http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/text-citation/ (APA)
Periodical publications for the General Public
If the invention of the print by Guttenberg meant a significant change in the

history of book publications, the Internet has brought the chance to publish in a
quick and more economical way. Nowadays, we can create our own newspaper
for free or even elaborate a new scientific journal in a short period. The tools that
we will look at in this section have been divided into two blocks depending on
their aims: general topics and academic purposes.
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Publications on general topics (Newspapers, Magazines, etc.)
Thanks to the Internet, publishing your own magazine is possible. Most of

the tools require paying a lisense, but we can try some demos to see how they
work. We will explore two methods: the easiest way, by curating its contents
(mostly free) and those based on pagination.
Publications created through curation methods
Curation is one of the easiest ways to publish fresh news without any effort.
Cambridge dictionary defines “curation” as the verb used to “to select things such as
documents, music, products, or Internet content to be included as part of a list or
collection, or on a website”. They are conceived as very simple way of online publishing
and became very successful with the emergence of syndication and microblogging.
Scoop.it
It is a very similar tool to Paper.li. It was launched some years ago, with a
free option and a more sophisticated one that involves a fee. Again, you can log
in using your Facebook or Twitter account or by creating a new Scoop account.
It works similarly to Twitter, by the re-scooping news that you may consider of
interest for you and your followers or people that may read your publications.
They affirm to be the largest and most connected curation publishing platform for
professionals by With Scoop.it Business by publishing content in your website,
social channels, and newsletters in just a few clicks.
Once you have your account ready, you can opt just for reading contents from
other websites or create your own topic. When adding content to your topic, you
will see icons to publish on Google +, Facebook or LinkedIn, at the same time.
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The result is very similar to Google Communities, in a sense the its interface looks
like a never-ending board where you can link URLs or show contents from other
scoop.it topics. This is the URL of the scoop.it created for this subject.
https://www.scoop.it/t/digital-competence-english-studies
Paper.li
Although this tool is more focused on business and finances, we can also take
advantage of its free version to create and maintain our own digital publication
based on feeds and Twitter to display content. This version does not permit any
changes. For example, you cannot add or remove headlines of your newspaper,
or include new topics, but you will find different ones per each day. This is the
URL of the publication created for this subject:
https://paper.li/apps_tic_ei/1350379343#/
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As you can see, you can share all the elements of the site easily through
different social networks.
Activity 5.2 Online publishing based on curation (Optional)
Open an account at Scoop.it or Paper.li. Remember that you can log in using
your Twitter or Facebook account. Do not forget to share your experience in the
forum.
Watch this video for paper.li https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTVSId4zgN0 or

this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKcUUrWK_JY if you want to try
scoop.it
** You can also explore both sites without having to create any new account if
you think you are not going to use this tool in the future.
Publications based on pagination
Creating online Magazines from scratch is perhaps a more difficult task to do

considering the tools that are currently available. These have been conceived for
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more professional aims and in most cases are more expensive too. Below you
can find some examples:
 E-page Creator 4
It is a tool to create unlimited digital publications from PDF, SWF and image
files. You can have different options depending on the price you have paid. The
magazine shown below has the following features: Share, Print, Save as PDF,
Background Color, Save as PDF and Thumbnail View.
The same company is offering other products to create e-books and apps
for Android and IOS for mobiles.
3DIssue
It is professional proprietary software, used by most powerful companies in

the world to create Flash & HTML5 magazines and e-books among many other
features. In the same way as e-page creator, it can adapt its final product to be
read by tablets, smartphones, and other mobile devices. As usual, you can
download a demo to test it. You will find a tutorial here showing how it works. It
can create e-books as well: http://www.3dissue.com/#
4
http://www.epagecreator.net/index.html
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3D issue sample created by Google company 5
Software developed for Academic /Scientific journals
They are not as widely accessible as the previous examples because they
been designed to be used by professional associations, universities and other
institutions. Probably most of the publications that you are reading either for this
subject or the TFG have been created with some of the tools introduced in this
section.
Public Knowledge Project (PKP)6
“PKP is a multi-university initiative developing (free) open source software

and conducting research to improve the quality and reach of scholarly publishing”.
It provides the following products:
Open Journal System (OJS), one of the most widely used software for
periodical publications. Some examples can be found here:
RIED http://revistas.uned.es/index.php/ried
International Journal of Applied Linguistics & Literature

http://www.journals.aiac.org.au/index.php/IJALEL
http://www.3dissue.com/magazine-samples/google/
5
http://pkp.sfu.ca/
6
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EPOS: Revista de Filología http://revistas.uned.es/index.php/EPOS
Open Conference System (OMP), which permits manage the conference flow of
proposals to review and publish proceedings. Some examples are:
Language Science Press http://langsci-press.org/
Smithsonian Institution Scholary Press
https://opensi.si.edu/index.php/smithsonian
Other products are: Open Monograph Press (to publish books) and Open
Harvester System (to index resources)
Open Edition Journals (former Revues.org)
OpenEdition is a portal of open electronic resources about Humanitities

and Social Sciences. It contains products like: Open Edition Books, Hypothèses
(academic blogs in Spanish French and German language), Calenda (to add and
receive alerts about academic and scientific events in French) or OpenEdition
Freemium.
Find below some examples related to English Studies:
Review du Linguistique et de Didactique des Langues http://lidil.revues.org/
Apprentissage des langues et systèmes d'information et de communication

http://alsic.revues.org/
Acquisition et d’interaction en langue étrangère http://aile.revues.org/
Corpus http://corpus.revues.org/
This is the appearence of an online book ready to read on screen.
https://books.openedition.org/pur/30504
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Apart from the tools and platforms mentioned above we can find other not so well-
known resources to create journals here:
http://library.queensu.ca/webir/planning/e-journal_publishing_support.htm
Creating a book/ e-book
Tools to create e-books are similar or even the same to the ones intended
to create e-magazines. There are platforms such as Lulu 7, which even help you
to send the book edited by your own. Some others, like Storybird 8, can help you
create an interactive book to be used and share in a classroom:
http://www.lulu.com/gb/
7
https://storybird.com/
8
publishing industry
publishing industry
Other tools simply convert a pdf file into an e-book format such as Calibre 9. It is
“open source e-book library management application developed by users of e-
books for users of e-books”.
To finish this unit, we will mention two mail proprietary software programs
in the publishing industry:
QuarkExpress 2018
It is one of the leading applications in the publishing industry to create any

kind of books in different formats (printed and online versions). We are not going
to try it in this course, but it is important to know of their existence. Some of its
features can be seen in the following video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7nj6qyTGLw :
http://calibre-ebook.com/
9
publishing industry
Adobe InDesignCC
It is a solution offered by Adobe suite which is very similar to QuarkXpress,

but it has been thought to produce material for electronic devices. Wikipedia
offers a complete article on the evolution of this program 10. It is being used
nowadays in the Digital Humanities fields, to enrich texts with additional
information and notes in a visible way Its appearance is very similar to other
applications of the same suite:
Internet accessibility and mobility
Accessibility could be described in two ways:
- An online document or tool is accessible when it can be easily

understood by everyone, regardless of what browser or adaptive
equipment he or she is using.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_InDesign
10
publishing industry
- Any document or tool can be accessed by any user regardless of the

device (e.g. visual browser, screen reader, mobile device) he or she is
using.
The amount of information spread on the web is growing day by day

exponentially. There are even some documents that have opted for being
published just in its online version. This fact has made official organisations
enable a minimum of accessibility in the websites they create. There are different
levels of accessibility:
Read the following website create to navigate on the BBC pages:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/accessibility/
Apple made a compromise with accessibility. That could be one of the main
reasons not to show Flash websites since this application is not easily convertible
to voice with the program that people impaired vision frequently use, called
Jaws 11.
This site introduces some of the most basic rules to make websites accessible
https://www.w3.org/WAI/fundamentals/accessibility-intro/ Mobile sites can also
be tested. However, apart from accessible, a website must be organised in such
a way that information can be found easily. This is called “usability”. Read the
following information to know more about this topic: http://www.usability.gov/
Usability is described by the ISO as "The extent to which a product can be used
by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency, and
satisfaction in a specified context of use."
Companies like Apple seem to be involved in matters of accessibility with pages

like this: https://www.apple.com/accessibility/ . Also, Google devote some
resources to this matter:
https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/accessibility/
Activity 5.3 Accessibility and usability
Check the accessibility of some websites of your interest at

https://www.tawdis.net/?lang=en .
Try to find information related to accessibility and the use of mobile devices.
Share your findings in the forum.
You can also visit Google and Apple websites created for accessibility to know
what they can offer in this area.
11
http://www.freedomscientific.com/products/fs/jaws-product-page.asp
publishing industry
To know more about this topic
Web Accessibility Initiative http://www.w3.org/WAI/
Accessibility and Usability at Penn State http://accessibility.psu.edu/ (It included

a free tutorial on the two matters)
If you want to feel more involved in the process of making some of the
audiovisual materials produced by ‘UNED accessible’, visit this site:
http://portal.uned.es/portal/page?_pageid=93,43144959&_dad=portal&_schema
=PORTAL
To know more about this units
Twitter List
https://twitter.com/apps_tic_ei/lists/unit-5
Google Community
https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/105656544029775584719/stream/fe19
99fa-4db6-448c-973d-23fec5017a75
Final work / PEC
Remember to use the template found in the virtual course to submit your work.
Final questions
Was this unit useful for you? Did it seem difficult?
What do you think about the tools to create your own publications? Have
you tried any of them?
Do you think you will be able to try to consider accessibility and usability
standards in your professional life?
Bibliography
https://www.mendeley.com/community/aplicaciones-de-las-tic-en-los-estudios-
ingleses/

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Unit 1.

Databases and electronic libraries for English Studies 1

Last update Oct 18th 2019

Unit 1. Databases and electronic libraries for English Studies

Part II. Web syndication as a research tool ................................................................ 31

 Do you know what a database is?

Aims and learning results

Part I. Information literacy

Activity 1.1 Knowing our Library

1. Humanidades Senda del Rey /Obispo Trejo (Humanidades, Ciencias, Derecho,

Databases & Bibliographic Platforms

A bibliographic database is a database of bibliographic records, an organised digital

Figure 1 Image taken from https://www.consorciomadrono.es/en/recursos-electronicos/

 MLA (Modern Languages Association) publications

MLA is an association of professionals related to the field of languages and humanistic

MLA International Bibliography, which includes Linguistics, Literature, Culture and

 ERIC (Education Resources Information Center). It is the most important database

Literature Online (LION)

Activity 1. 2 Working with LION

Other databases not subscribed by UNED

Linguistics Collection (Full coverage of phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and

You can find more information here http://media2.proquest.com/documents/linguistics-

Linguistics Abstracts Online

America: History and Life

 Early English books online (EEBO)

Generic bibliographic databases

Activity 1.3 Working with Dialnet

Create an account at Dialnet (https://dialnet.unirioja.es/) and subscribe to 3 publications

 Other generic databases

REBIUN http://www.rebiun.org/Paginas/Inicio.aspx is a collective catalogue comprised by most

 ExLibris, the new UNED Library platform

- the pin means that you have saved that reference,

Activity.1.4 Knowing the UNED catalogue (ExLibris Platform)

Open online resources

- Ebook central (ebrary before) http://tinyurl.com/y8fsvfwe . It is a platform owned by ProQuest

Figure 2 Example taken from http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.uned.es/science/book/9780081001707

E-BUNED is another platform to read ebooks based on xebook 5 technology, which is

Click here to read

 Open Access Libraries

Activity 1.5 Knowing other libraries and databases

Part II. Web syndication as a research tool

Web syndication is a form of syndication [arrangement] in which website

This is done by adding XML code (Extensible Makeable Language) that

Activity 1.6 Aggregators & Feeds (Optional)

Comment your experience in the forum (unit 1).

Unit 1 Twitter List

End of Unit 1 Questionnaire

Cohen, S. M. (2004). RSS. Computers in libraries: Complete coverage of library information

Last update Oct 21st, 2019

Unit 2. Bibliographic management applications

Concept of Bibliographic management applications (BMA)

Main elements of a BMA

Adding new data

1. Adding new references to your BMA

3. Generating bibliographic references automatically

One of most gratifying functions of these applications is the possibility to create

Directly from the application

Using a Word Processor

Remember to select the new version of RW: