Finding information for your major assignment

This Assignment help guide will provide key strategies and tips to find supporting references for your major report.

While this assignment doesn't have a specific question to address, the aims of the report are to describe the ecosystem of the survey site, summarising the most useful field data to interpret the ecological relationships between plants, animals, and physical environment, and to discuss the management actions needed for conservation and sustainability.

Any questions about the assignment should be clarified with the teaching team.

Watch this video (7 min 52 sec) to help reinforce the key concepts in your course.

Biological surveys are a key method for collecting detailed information on the size, distribution, abundance, growth, recruitment, and mortality for species of plants and animals in marine and terrestrial environments. Surveys aim to improve biodiversity knowledge and inform conservation management practices.
This description has been adapted from:

Detailed survey manuals to contribute to the Biological Databases of South Australia:

South Australian Park Listings

Examples

Getting to know the terminology used to describe ecosystems, conservation management and different flora and fauna relevant to your survey is critical to searching effectively for this assignment.

Draw on your own knowledge and concepts raised within the course.

Depending on what you discover as you do your survey, consider searching on:

When thinking of keywords consider:

Take a moment to watch the below video and have a look at the short guide provided.

The Library Collection is a good place to start your search for supporting references. You can use it to find books, journal articles, reports, videos and more ...

Search example

1. Type your keywords into the search box
   • dune restoration
2. Add any geographic or location keywords to your search if relevant
   • dune restoration Australia
3. Add any synonyms of alternative keywords using the connector OR
   • (dune OR dunefield OR coastal) restoration Australia

• If you are using a single search box use brackets to group keywords
• Use double quotes " " to keep concepts together as a phrase
• Use the limits from the right menu to narrow your results further

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Databases are online collections of resources including articles, papers, book chapters and reports. They have advanced search options, helping to focus your search and find more relevant, scholarly references quickly.

Key Library databases

Become familiar with some of the key biodiversity databases below.

These databases include literature from around the world. If you need Australian content either:

• search using the keyword Australia (or other location keywords);
• or, limit by geographic region or country.

Search example

1. Type your first concept and alternative concepts into the advanced search box Tip: change Anywhere to Anywhere except full text

2. Select + Add a row and add further concepts into the search box Tip: use double quotes to keep concepts together as a phrase Tip: DO NOT tick the box to limit to Full Text

3. Refine results by using the menu on the left of the page, these can include limiting by Location.

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CSIRO ebooks in the collection

A great place for getting overview about topics and regions.

Grey literature

Australian reports, government documents, policy and data information.

It is important that you critically evaluate the quality of the literature you find to make sure it is suitable to use. You can go back to the parameters of the assignment to remind yourself:

• What types of information do you need?
• Do references found support your findings and provide wider context?

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Plants

Invertebrates

Birds

This resource assists with developing professional skills to work with purpose and sensitivity across cultures. The principles involved in working with Aboriginal communities presented here, are fundamental to working effectively and respectfully across ALL cultures.

Academic integrity

Find out more about what is expected from you as a UniSA student and how you can demonstrate academic integrity throughout your degree.

Referencing

You can use bibliographic management software to store, organise and cite your references. The Library supports the bibliographic management tool EndNote, although there are many free systems available.

For this assignment you need to use the Austral Ecology referencing style. Information about this style can be found in the Biological Survey Methods manual (on your course site).

If you use EndNote, download the Austral Ecology Referencing Style:

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