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Image of mathematical symbols for post on Pi Anyone? International Pi Day

Pi Anyone? International Pi Day

14/03/2023 / / 0 Comments

Pi Anyone? International Pi Day

The 14th of March is International Day of Mathematics and International Pi Day.

What is International Mathematics Day?

On the 26th of November 2019 UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation) decided March the 14th should be declared the International Day of Mathematics.

The main purpose of the day was to celebrate and highlight the importance of Mathematics. Making people aware mathematics is everywhere and used in everyday life, as well as in specialist industries.

Prior to the birth of International Mathematics Day, the 14th of March was International Pi Day. Continue reading

Craiglockhart Library facilities

Changes to the spaces at Craiglockhart library

27/02/2023 / / 0 Comments

Changes to the spaces at Craiglockhart library

We have made some changes to the library spaces at Craiglockhart campus over the past few months. By removing unused bookshelves at the rear of the library the area is now much more open and the space is being used more effectively.

The relaxation space has been made larger and is brighter and less confined. There are lots of helpful books and posters promoting relaxation, taking time out from your studies and de-stressing. Look out for our different suggestions throughout the year from birdwatching to beachcombing. We have provided some new games, non-academic books and origami paper. We have increased the amount of seating and returned the cushions and throws to the area.

Shelf Help

Our shelf help books are now in a dedicated space making them easier to find.

The jigsaw tables have been moved away from study spaces and there are extra puzzles to help complete.

There are 4 new single study booths and 2 extra round tables for groups, along with some new social seating. All these spaces are available on a first come first served basis so if you think you would like to use any of them, arrive early as they are proving popular!

PCs

Along with the changes to the library spaces some of our PCs now have dual monitors.

We hope you like the changes and think the new spaces are useful, and please remember, your feedback is always welcome.

We have access to shelf help through our blog https://libguides.napier.ac.uk/shelfhelp

And more information on Craiglockhart library https://my.napier.ac.uk/library/about-the-library/craiglockhart

 

International cat day cat Bon Bon

Pets of the Library Part 2

20/02/2023 / / 1 Comment

Pets of the Library Part 2

After the last few years of remote working and with staff working more from home now, meeting their feline companions during online meetings has been so much fun. Little furry faces and tails have often popped up mid-way through a very important discussion. Many of our staff have loved being able to spend more time with their creatures of choice; I know I love having a friendly work buddy to hang out with at home during the workday.

So to celebrate this year’s International Love your pet day we think it would be nice to introduce you all to some of our furry friends.

Continue reading

Stressed student photo from A Guide to Beating Exam Stress

A Guide to Beating Exam Stress

09/12/2022 / / 0 Comments

A Guide to Beating Exam Stress

It might be hard to believe, but exams are nearly here and 2022 is nearly over. I know, right!?

The exam period can be a highly stressful time, and it’s understandable you may be feeling overwhelmed, stressed or unsure about how to manage yourself and your time. If you’re looking for help, there are a number of places you can go to find it.

Our libraries are open to you for individual and group study. We’ve got a great variety of resources if you’re in need of some study tips, no matter where you are in your academic journey. Pop on over to our exam support reading list for resources on studying smart, mindfulness, taking successful exams, study skills, and beating stress.

Here are our top tips to help get you through.

Top Tips for Beating Exam Stress

1. Timetable and prepare a study plan.

2. Create a study space that is comfortable, quiet, well-lit, organized, and has no distractions nearby.

3. Put your information into a format that allows you to absorb it best.

4. Take regular study breaks. Alternating subjects you’re studying will also help.

5. Remember self-care!

6. Schedule fun activities to reduce your stress.

7. Eat nutritious foods and exercise regularly to keep your brain power and energy up!

8. Make sure you have all the items you need for any exams. Get them ready the day before to avoid rushing on the day.

9. Remove anything distracting to help you focus. Try putting your phone in a different room when revising.

10. Write down revision targets for the day, review your progress, and update your revision timetable and targets appropriately.

Most of all:  Remember to rest – get a good night’s sleep – and also relax! Check out our Virtual Relaxation Space, Or one of our special exam chillout areas in all our Libraries. You can find them next to the relaxation zones.

Keep an eye out on our Digital screens for more exam tips. Here’s a taster:

Further Support

Please do remember that if you’re experiencing difficulties, get in touch with Napier’s Counselling & Mental Wellbeing service. Drop them an email at counselling@napier.ac.uk or call them on 0131 455 2459.

Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

Winter and Christmas recommendations

05/12/2022 / / 0 Comments

Winter and the Christmas holidays are just around the corner, so it’s time to get cosy, put your feet up and get your fluffy socks on, have a hot drink, and enjoy some winter-warming content!

 

Here are some of the library recommendations this season:

 

Dr Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas 

 

The Grinch is a solitary creature that lives on Mount Crumpit and tries to cancel Christmas by stealing decorations and presents in the town of Whoville on Christmas Eve.

 

Merchiston DVD Collection 791.4334 HOW 

 

 

 

Image of the Grinch with a coffee

The Grinch with a coffee Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

 

 

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

 

This classic novel addresses social class and human values, about an orphan named Pip, who encounters Magwitch an escaped convict, and Miss Havisham a spinster rejected by her lover on her wedding day. Pip falls in love with Estella who has been raised by Miss Havisham taught to show unrequited love.

 

https://napier.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/44NAP_INST/13v8mut/alma9920447910102111

 

Merchiston Main stock 823.8 DIC

 

The Winter’s Tale William Shakespeare

 

A play in five acts- a romance or tragic comedy, consumed with jealousy and the power of love. In the first half, Leontes imprisons his pregnant wife on suspicion of infidelity. In the second half his lost daughter is rescued by shepherds and has fallen in love with a young prince.

 

https://napier.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/44NAP_INST/13v8mut/alma9920698270102111 

 

Merchiston Main stock 822.33 SHA

 

 

The Nutcracker

 

This is the most popular ballet and takes place during a Christmas party, where a young child named Clara is gifted a nutcracker doll and at night the doll comes to life in a twist of magical adventures.

 

You can watch the Royal Ballet on Box of Broadcasts: 

 

https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ondemand/index.php/prog/001048B6?bcast=76072199

 

Image of the Nutcracker Ballet Dancer

The Nutcracker Ballet Photo by Hudson Hintze on Unsplash

 

 

The Chronicles of Narnia. The lion, the witch, and the wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

 

Fantasy novel set in World War Two, where four children are evacuated to live in the countryside. Upon which they discover a wardrobe that leads to a mysterious land named Narnia, inhabited by Mythical creatures, and ruled by the White Witch.

 

Merchiston DVD collection 791.4372 CHR 

 

You can find more resources on our Christmas reading list here.

 

 

 

International Day of Persons with Disabilities

03/12/2022 / / 0 Comments

Held annually on 3 December International Day of Persons with Disabilities was established by the United Nations (UN) in 1992 with the aim of promoting the rights and well-being of persons with disabilities, and breaking down the social and physical barriers faced which prevent persons with disabilities from participating fully in many aspects of daily life.   

Edinburgh Napier University welcomes people with disabilities, long-term health conditions and specific learning difficulties and is committed to providing students with support in all aspects of University life and aims to provide a positive and supportive environment for all students. 

The Library aims to support people with disabilities and those with individual needs by providing services such as assistance when collecting items from shelves and understanding library layouts, providing texts in digital formats, and enabling a designated friend/family member (with permission) to act on your behalf. If you require them, there are height-adjustable desks and accessible toilets in each of the Libraries.  

For eligible students with a print impairment, the Disability Inclusion Team can also set up accounts to Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) Bookshare, a huge online digital library. RNIB Bookshare opens up the world of reading in education for learners with a print-disability, including those with dyslexia or who are blind or partially sighted. 

 

 

Image of laptop on a desk

Laptop on a desk Photo by Christopher Gower on Unsplash

 

There are many different assistive technology products, equipment, and systems available to enhance learning, working, and daily living for students with disabilities and learning difficulties. The products available to help you with your studies are listed on the Assistive Technology webpages in the Disability Inclusion section on My Napier. These include browser extensions you can install to help with reading, focusing, and viewing documents. Software available includes ClaroRead, a multi-sensory software solution for supporting reading and writing, with visual tools that colour, highlight, and focus on difficult-to-read text, and allows you to read any on-screen text out loud. Sonocent Audio Notetaker is an audio recording app which allows you to annotate your audio recording by adding text notes and coloured category highlighting, either live or when listening back to the recording. These are just a few of the products available to you. Why not have a look at the webpage and see if there might be something to help your studies. 

 

If you are looking for support or would like to find out more about how the Disability Inclusion Team can help you, all the information you need is on the Disability Inclusion webpages on My Napier or you can email disabilityandinclusion@napier.ac.uk. 

If you have any questions about how the Library can support you, please email us at library@napier.ac.uk, phone us on 0131 455 3500, or see our Library webpages.  

 

By Sarah Jeffcott

  

St Andrew’s Day

30/11/2022 / / 0 Comments

What is Saint Andrew’s Day? 

Each year St Andrew’s day, or the feast day of Saint Andrew, is celebrated in Scotland on 30th November. 

St Andrew has officially been the patron saint of Scotland since 1320 when Scotland became independent with the Declaration of Arbroath.  

St Andrew is not only the patron saint of Scotland; we share our patron saint with Romania, Greece, Russia, Ukraine, and Poland, among others. 

A patron saint is regarded as a protector or guide of a nation, place or person. https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/st-andrews-day-november-30-22264412 

 

 

Painting of St Andrew

Saint Andrew Source 

 

Who was Saint Andrew? 

Although not a huge amount is known about Saint Andrew, according to the Christian faith Andrew the apostle was one of the twelve disciples of Jesus. He was also the brother of Simon Peter, who would become Saint Peter. 

He was born in what is now known as Israel, probably between 5 and 10AD. St Andrew was one of the first disciples of Jesus: according to the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, Andrew and Peter were fishermen, who were said to have followed Jesus immediately when he said to them “I will make you fishers of men”. 

Saint Andrew is said to have travelled far and wide during his life to preach the teachings of Jesus. It is also alleged that St Andrew was crucified on an ‘X’ shaped cross, which is why the Scottish flag (the Saint Andrew’s Cross) has a white cross on it. 

 

 

Scottish flag

Source 

 

 

How can I celebrate Saint Andrew’s Day? 

St Andrew’s day can be celebrated by donning your kilt for a ceilidh (Scottish dancing) and listening to Scottish music, partaking of some Scottish food or a dram o’ whisky perhaps. There may be local events that you can join in with too – see the links below for some ideas: 

What’s On Edinburgh 

Visit Scotland 

Edinburgh Guide  

 

Read more about Scottish History 📚 

 

If you want to learn more about Scottish History, check out the shelves at Sighthill Campus at Dewey number 941 or search LibrarySearch – here are some examples of articles and books held within our treasure trove of a library catalogue 😊: 

  • Rowlands, E. W., & Masaccio. (2003). Masaccio Saint Andrew and the Pisa altarpiece. Getty Publications.  

https://napier.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/44NAP_INST/19n0mho/cdi_proquest_reports_199722299 

 

Learn more about LibrarySearch here. 

 

Sources: 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/20556587 

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Andrew 

https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/st-andrews-day-november-30-22264412 

 

By Judy Wheeler

Person on Computer - Edinburgh Napier’s repository – a home for the university’s research

Edinburgh Napier’s Repository – a home for the university’s research

28/11/2022 / / 0 Comments

Edinburgh Napier’s repository – a home for the university’s research

A repository is a kind of digital archive for storing all the research outputs created by a university’s academics and researchers. Most importantly, it also makes much of this research publicly available for everyone to read and download. The Edinburgh Napier Research Repository is the home for Edinburgh Napier’s research. We moved to the current repository platform earlier this year, so it might look a little different now if you were familiar with the old one.

Open Access

Making research open access in the repository benefits researchers whose work can be more widely read and cited. It’s also great for students who can access research much more easily. Almost every university has a repository now.  so you can use aggregator services like CORE to find research from around the world. CORE includes the 20,000+ outputs from Napier’s repository and millions more as well. Take a look at our open-access LibGuide with more tips for finding open-access research.

 

 

Screen shot of the University Research Repository

Screenshot of the University Research Repository

 

 

WorkTribe

For Edinburgh Napier academics and researchers who want to curate their own profile or add new research outputs to the repository, just log in to Worktribe using your usual university credentials. If you need any help, check out the support pages on the intranet or feel free to email repository@napier.ac.uk with any questions about open access – including publishing open-access journal articles using one of the library’s publisher deals.

The repository is not just for academic staff though. In fact, Research students can be set up with a profile if they have publications to share. Furthermore, all postgraduate theses awarded by Edinburgh Napier are made available in the repository and then included in the British Library’s national thesis collection for anyone to read.

And that’s what repositories are all about. Making it easier for everyone to find and share the knowledge our universities create.

 

By Stuart Lawson

 

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash

image of old tv for post World Television Day

World Television Day

21/11/2022 / / 0 Comments

World Television Day

The invention of the television was revolutionary. It is largely credited to Scottish inventor John Logie Baird who rolled out commercial usage in the 1920s. But the term television is believed to have been created by Russian scientist Constantin Perskyi, tele is ancient Greek for far while visio is Latin for sight. The usage of the name TV dates to 1948, but when we in Britain started using the word telly, I can’t say. Since its invention, the television has changed the world and impacted our lives in ways that the inventors never imagined. On the 21st of November, we recognise that impact.

History

World Television Day was announced by the United Nations in 1996 following the first World Television Forum in the previous November. Since then, World Television Day has become an annual recognised day. The World Television forum was not simply to celebrate but to recognise the impact that television has on ‘public opinion and world decision making’. Television was the starting point of communication and transparency in the world.

Library Resources

However, the most obvious way to mark this day is of course to watch television. And at the library, we have access to the humble yet mighty Box of Broadcasts, also known as BOB. Since 1948. BOB has led ‘the discovery, citation and responsible use of audio-visual material in education and research’. You will be able to find BOB on LibrarySearch, make sure you are signed in to have complete access. BOB has access to over 75 ‘free to air channels’, access to 10 foreign language channels and over 3 million broadcasts on its database. Not only that but you can create your own playlist, watch on the device, embed links, and use them for academic referencing. We can’t shout the praises of BOB enough; it is truly a marvellous database that we can’t recommend enough.

 

By Maya Green

Image source: Photo by Stephen Monterroso on Unsplash

Read more on the blog here

Yellow Pudsey Bear

Children in Need

18/11/2022 / / 0 Comments

 

Friday 18th November sees Children in need return to our screens. 

But what is it about? 

Every year, the BBC and other partners join a huge fundraising drive to raise money for children’s charities across the UK. This culminates in a BBC TV Appeal show on Friday 18th November where celebrities come together to provide entertainment, raise funds, and inspire people to donate to the cause by sharing stories of the children the charity supports. 

“We fund thousands of charities and projects in every corner of the UK, that support children and young people to feel and be safer, have improved mental health and wellbeing, form better, more positive relationships and be given more equal opportunities to flourish.” 

This blog post will take a little look at the history of Children in Need and how you can watch the action using the University’s subscription to BoB (Box of Broadcasts)! 

 

History of Children in Need 

Here are some highlights from the almost one hundred years that Children in Need has been fundraising: 

  • 1927 saw (or heard!) the first ever children’s BBC radio appeal, with £1300 raised for children’s charities.  
  • It wasn’t until 1955 that the first televised appeal graced our screens – a Christmas appeal presented by Sooty and Harry Corbett. 
  • In 1980, the first Children in Need telethon raised £1 million, presented by Terry Wogan, Sue Lawley and Esther Rantzen. 
  • In 1985, Pudsey Bear became the BBC Children in Need mascot. He has had several makeovers over the years, going from brown to yellow and has also changed the design of his bandana a few times!  
  • In 2007, at 22 years old, he became the Pudsey we know today, with a colourful polka-dotted bandana. 
  • 2011 and 2012 saw Matt Baker take on the Rickshaw challenge, and in 2009 Children in Need celebrated its 30th televised appeal. 
  • In 2018, £1 billion had been raised for Children in Need since 1980. Wow! 

 

For a complete history of Children in Need see the links at the bottom of the page. 

 

Pudsey Bear on blue circle

Pudsey Bear on a blue circle

 

Appeal Night Friday 18th November: 

This year the Children in Need programme is called the ‘Great SPOTacular Appeal Night’ on Friday 18th November, and will be live on BBC One and iPlayer. 

The presenters for this year have been announced, you can see them here. 

 

Not in on Friday 18th November? Don’t worry, you can catch up on Box of Broadcasts. 

Box of Broadcasts (BoB) gives students and staff at Edinburgh Napier access to TV and radio recordings. BoB allows you to view TV and radio programmes from the BBC and choose and record upcoming broadcast programmes (you need to be in the UK to use BoB).  

BoB is available at Learning on Screen or via the LibrarySearch A-Z Database list. 

See BoB short video tutorials and frequently asked questions.  

 

 

For more info about Children in Need and Box of Broadcasts: 

https://www.bbcchildreninneed.co.uk/about-us/what-we-do/ 

https://www.bbcchildreninneed.co.uk/about-us/history/ 

https://my.napier.ac.uk/library/finding-resources/tv-for-learning 

 

By Judy Wheeler

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