Before you search - plan your strategy for finding the information you need.

The Search Strategy Planner - a useful tool for breaking the planning process down into logical and manageable steps.

STEP 1: Summarise your topic
Clearly state your topic in your own words in one or two sentences. Be as specific as possible.

I would like to find information about effects of land clearing on Australian wildlife

STEP 2: Underline the keywords and phrases
Underline the key words/phrases in your sentence. (For this example they have been bolded)

I would like to find information about effects of land clearing on Australian wildlife

STEP 3: Identify synonyms/alternatives to these keywords
Identify other phrases, synonyms and variant forms of words that describe the keywords and phrases you have underlined. You may need to use a thesaurus to help you identify some alternative words.

Keyword 1: effects, impact/s

Keyword 2: land clearing, clear-felling, deforestation, forest fragmentation

Keyword 3: Australian, Australia

Keyword 4: wildlife, wild animals, fauna, individual species - possums, koalas, wombats, eagles, parrots etc

STEP 4: Create a search

TIP - Use wild card characters to search for variations on the stem of a word, including plurals, or for variant spelling.

For example: Using manag* when searching will retrieve manage, management, managing, manager, managers.

Using quotation marks "" to search for a phrase e.g. "Great barrier Reef".

wildlife effect* "land clearing" Australia*

fauna impact* deforest* Australia*

"wild animal" effect* clear-felling Australia*

wildlife impact* "forest fragmentation" Australia*

TIP - More information on Assignment writing.