Step 1: Digital Libraries Scholarly Article, writing homework help

• GEN103 A Digital Library
• Introduction to the Ashford University Library

Step 2: Popular and Scholarly Sources
Now, watch the GEN103 Scholarly & Popular Resources video. After watching this video, you know the importance of carefully considering information and sources.  Conduct an interesting comparison between the information found in a popular source and a scholarly source.

• Select a topic that you are particularly interested in.  Examples would be “the benefits of red wine,” “how genes influence disease,” “school lunches contribute to obesity,” “legalizing drugs will lead to lower crime,” etc.

• Using the Internet, find an article on the topic you have chosen and carefully read it, taking time to notice the images included with article, how much detailed information is provided, what kind of evidence the author used, how the article is arranged and similar characteristics.

Step 3: Find a Scholarly Source from the Ashford University Library
Next, you will find a scholarly source related to the same topic in the Ashford University Library.

• Watch the Findit@AU tutorial and take note of the strategies from the GEN103 Ashford University Library: Keywords are Critical tutorial to help you find a scholarly source related to your chosen topic from the Ashford University Library.

• Using the FindIt@AU search box on the library home page, locate a scholarly research article on the same topic as the website that you found.  Make sure you put a check in the box for scholarly/peer reviewed before clicking search when using the databases.  Scholarly articles are often more challenging to read than popular articles.  Take a few minutes to watch the Strategic Ways to Read Scholarly Articles video (written transcript) and then examine and read the scholarly article, noticing how it is different from the popular article that you found online.

• Summarize the topic you chose to research.  Did you find that both article provided the same information on the topic?  
• What specific similarities and differences did you notice in the ways that the popular source you found on the Internet and the scholarly source you found in the Ashford University Library presented information?  
• Based on what you learned this week, when is a scholarly source more appropriate to use? When is a popular source, such as a news article, more appropriate?
• What insights did you gain about the use of scholarly sources in an academic environment?

Be sure to include the correctly formatted APA references for both articles—the scholarly article from the Ashford University Library and the popular article that you found online–at the end of your discussion.
Your initial post should contain a minimum of 350 wordswritten in complete sentences. It must answer all aspects of the prompt (refer to “Think about it this way” below).  It must be posted by 11:59 Thursday evening.  Correctly cite the source of any information that you use in your posts.