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Database tutorials

Learn how to search databases.

Database tutorials

The Education Database provides full text access to scholarly literature - the majority from scholarly journals but also including dissertations and theses as well as trade journals. The majority of content dates from 1980 onwards and it has a multi-national focus. 

The Education database sits on the ProQuest platform - see more on the ProQuest Platform LibGuide. 

For information on the Education Database, visit ProQuest's Education Database LibGuide. This contains information on Basic, Advanced and Command line searching. 

ProQuest Training. (2018). Advanced Search. https://youtu.be/6p2eJqJT0SI?si=3pzY53n59Q3J53eH

ERIC includes a range of records to scholarly literature as well as grey literature. 

The Library provides access to the ERIC database via two vendors - ProQuest and Ebsco. The content is the same but the interface is different. 

Please note: From April 2025, in response to the US Government's EO 14222, the number of records added to the ERIC collection will be significantly reduced going forward. All records currently in ERIC are expected to remain available.

For information on ERIC choose one of the vendor links below.

Visit ProQuest's ERIC LibGuide. This contains information on Basic, Advanced and Command line searching. A video tutorial on the the ProQuest platform is provided on the Education Database tab. 

Visit EBSCOConnect (EBSCO's training platform) for a thirty minute tutorial providing an overview of the ERIC database.  A video tutorial on the the EBSCOhost platform is provided below. 

EBSCO Tutorials. (2025).  Advanced Searching on the New EBSCO User Interfaces - Tutorial. https://youtu.be/kM0_IfwfsKQ?si=FX9Yxx3ZJOCqrjic

Informit. (2020, December 2). Informit - New platform overview. https://youtu.be/cEjWz2j0HKw

Use the timestamps to skip to the topic of interest.

These include: Login, Searching, Saving results, Exporting citations and Personalisation features.

A range of tutorials are available from the Scopus tutorial page.

These include:

You can sign up for a 90 minute on demand training session - Web of Science essentials. 

Web of Science has recently updated their search interface and Smart Searching (AI supported) is now the default. You can find out how this works and decide if you wish to turn it off by reading about Smart Searching. 

An introductory video on searching in topic or all feeds is below. 

Web of Science Help Center. (2025). Start searching with Topic or All Fields. https://videos.clarivate.com/watch/esMsL74WTtKgDqsHk84QeP?

Wingaru provides La Trobe University specific guidance:

 

Other resources of interest on the La Trobe Portal login include access to free Professional Development, the Wingaru philosophy, upcoming events of interest and a link to the Wingaru blog.

Using Google Scholar

Set up Google Scholar preferences to find items held by La Trobe University Library when you are searching off campus.

Search tips

  • Check the Advanced search strategies on the Databases and Journals tab
  • Consider differences in American English and Australian English spelling
  • If a word is sometimes hyphenated, search using the hyphen and find both terms
  • Limits will refine your search results: language, human, gender, age, date or type of publication
  • Check the database Help or Tips to find advice on which symbol to use for truncation or wildcard, and provide other helpful tips

Stay current

Areas of study and research are constantly changing as research takes place and new knowledge is gained. Setting up alerts will help you to keep up to date. You can set up alerts to be notified when:

  • a newly published article matches your search strategy
  • key journals in your area publish a new issue
  • an article of interest is referenced or cited in new publications or articles

See the Alerting services guide for more information