Peer Review
Advantages of peer review to scholar-practitioner
Peer review has both merits and disadvantages depending on one’s argument and perception. Considering the merits, peer review helps scholar-practitioners in various capacities. It provides the needed criticism to various scholarly works, which includes articles and journals. Such criticisms are extremely essential to scholar-practitioners in various perspectives. For instance, criticism helps in identifying weak points of scholar-practitioners’ works (journals). This, in turn, helps the scholar-practitioner to avoid his current mistakes while working on his other journals. Moreover, it also helps scholar-practitioners improve their future works or journals thus giving quality academic outcomes. Peer reviews also refine the works or journals written by scholar-practitioners. It helps in revising journals thus modifying the works of scholar-practitioners to a better academic product. This ensures that the best and most refined academic work of the scholar-practitioner is published for viewers or readers (Molnar, 2011).
Ways of determining peer-reviewed articles
There are various ways one can determine whether peers have reviewed any two articles. For instance, one can search on peer-reviewed websites to determine whether the articles exist in the sites. This is possible by searching the name of the journal in the peer-reviewed website (CALPOLY, 2011). If the articles appear, then it has been reviewed. One can also know that an article has been reviewed by looking at the front cover of the article (David, 2011). Some journals always provide information on whether the article has been reviewed by peers on front pages. However, it is necessary to understand that the information must not always be on the first page. Therefore, sometimes one will have to look in the entire journal to determine that the article has been reviewed. Another way of asking whether the article was indeed reviewed is by contacting the editor of the document or article.
Describing Total Information Networks
Online resources
Numerous resources are continuously being posted in various Internet sites. However, these online resources often have both scholarly and non scholarly journals. These resources offer a wide range of information needed for any research or study. However, it is imperative for one to evaluate the nature of a resource before using them, since some of them are often invalid thus unreliable. An example of a link that provides numerous journals that can be significant for carrying out an extensive study, which contains adequate information. Sites are also suitable locations for obtaining the reliable information.
Academic libraries
Academic libraries also contain a wide range of information that can help in conducting various research projects. They contain books, journals, newspapers, electronic resources and other various materials necessary for conducting academic research. These libraries are often found in learning institutions such as colleges and universities. Some of these academic libraries often limit the access of information by strangers; therefore, only students and staffs are allowed to visit the libraries. It is also imperative to understand that academic libraries also offer Internet services, whereby one can access scholarly sites suitable for researches.
Public libraries
These are institutions, which offer library services to anyone (Edwards, 2009). They contain a wide range of information, similar to academic libraries. However, most public libraries consist of more information than most academic libraries. They contain information about various historical events, preserved for reference or academic purposes. They also contain various resources such as books, journals, newspapers and other reading materials. One can access these books in these libraries or borrow the books to access them at preferred locations. Most resources in public libraries are often scholarly thus making them reliable.
References
CALPOLY. (2011). Peer-reviewed articles. CALPOLY. Web.
David, I. (2011). How to know when an article is peer-reviewed. University of Liverpool.
Edwards, B. (2009). Libraries and learning resource centers. Oxford, OX: Architectural Press.
Molnar, W. (2011). The importance of peer-review of scholarly journals. Sribd. Web.