Research > Homework Center > General reference

General Reference

Ask An Expert
Encyclopedias & almanacs
Dewey Decimal System
Dictionaries & Thesauri
Language dictionaries
Language lessons
Pictures & photos

Quotations
Quick reference & world facts
Sign language dictionaries
Subject-specific dictionaries
Time & calendars
World facts, population & Statistics

Ask An Expert

Ask the Experts: http://www.refdesk.com/expert.html

refdesk.com collects all the different Ask an Expert sites on one page.
AskA+ Locator: http://www.vrd.org/locator/

Compiles "Ask An Expert" sites into one searchable online database. Profiles of each AskA service include identification information (e.g., publisher, e-mail address, contact person, links to services' home pages), scope, target audience, and a general description of the service.

Encyclopedias & almanacs

Encyclopedias

Online Music Encyclopedia: http://go.grolier.com

Encyclopedia Britannica's guide to Internet sites broken down into clickable subjects or search for a topic. Choose the Internet guide to search for Web sites.
britannica.com: http://www.britannica.com

Encyclopedia Britannica's guide to Internet sites broken down into clickable subjects or search for a topic. Choose the Internet guide to search for Web sites.
Online Music Encyclopedia: http://library.thinkquest.org/10400/html/

Sound clips using RealAudio focus on different areas of music and people, such as saxaphone greats.

Almanacs

Afro-American Almanac: http://www.toptags.com/aama/

Biographies, historical documents and events, folk tales, trivia games, and speeches and commentary by and about the African-American experience.
Guinness World Records: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/index.asp

Search or browse for a world record.
Infoplease: http://www.infoplease.com/

Dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs and lists of quick facts information!
The Old Farmer's Alamanac: http://www.almanac.com/

The online version of the Farmer's Almanac including tide tables, sun/moon rise and set, and weather forecasts.
World Alamanc for Kids: http://www.worldalmanacforkids.com/explore/

Get facts about any number of things.

Dewey Decimal System

About Dewey: http://www.oclc.org/dewey/

The website includes a history of the classification system as well as a biography of Melvil Dewey.
Can You Do the Dewey?: http://www.thrall.org/dewey/

This website for younger students includes a biography, a quick history of the system and an interactive quiz to test one's Dewey knowledge.
Do We Really Know Dewey?: http://library.thinkquest.org/5002/

This Thinkquest website explores both the classification system and the man who created it.

Dictionaries & Thesauri

Bartelby.com: http://www.bartleby.com/

A mix of dictionaries, thesauri, quotations, and books.
Baehind the Name: http://www.behindthename.com/

Etymology and history of first names.
WWWebster Online Dictionary: http://www.m-w.com/netdict.htm

Find out the definition to a word online!
NetLingo: http://www.netlingo.com/inframes.html

Discover definitions and meanings to Internet terms here.
Quoteland.com: http://www.quoteland.com/

Search for quotes here.
Roget: The New Thesaurus: http://www.bartleby.com/62/

Search for like terms here.
A Semantic Rhyming Dictionary: http://bobo.link.cs.cmu.edu/cgi-bin/dougb/rhyme.cgi

Find words that rhyme, almost rhyme and words that sound alike.

Pictures & photos

AV Photo and Media Finder: http://www.altavista.com/image

From Alta Vista. Search for images, video and audio clips. Includes millions of images and other media. Select the type of media you want to search on, images, videos, audios then type your search words into the box.
Life Photo Gallery: http://www.life.com/Life/lifephotos.html

Life Magazine presents classic photos from over 36 years in its magazine.
NYPL: Picture Collection Online: http://digital.nypl.org/mmpco/

New York Public Library provides a searchable database.
Animal Pictures Archive: http://www.animalpicturesarchive.com/

Browse or search by keyword for a photo of the animal of your choice. Over 30,000 images.
Corbis: The Place for Pictures on the Internet: http://www.corbis.com/

Search for images and pictures of any animal or thing!
ditto.com: http://www.ditto.com/

This visual search engine will help you find pictures on the Web.
FDR Library & Digital Archives: Online Photos: http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/photos.html

Explore photographs of Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt, World War II, and the Great Depression. Photos are searchable.
Life Photo Gallery: http://www.life.com/Life/lifephotos.html

Gallery of Life Magazine's classic and famous pictures.

Language dictionaries

ARTFL Project: French-English Dictionary Form: http://humanities.uchicago.edu/forms_unrest/FR-ENG.html

An English-French and French-English dictionary.
Babel Fish Translation: http://babelfish.altavista.com

Translate from one language to another.
Basic Spanish Words with Pronounciation: http://members.aol.com/alvareze/spanish/frame.html

Listen to how the words are pronounced.
Braille Bug: http://www.afb.org/braillebug/

An introduction to braille, including a biography of Louis Braille, games and more.
Language Dictionaries and Translators: Online Courses: http://www.word2word.com/course.html

Learn a language online. Over 50 languages to choose from!
Little Explorers: http://www.EnchantedLearning.com/Dictionary.html

Picture Dictionary with links!
LOGOS: http://www.dicologos.org/pls/dictionary/new_dictionary.index_p

A multi-language dictionary!
Spanish to English/English to Spanish Dictionary: http://www.freedict.com/onldict/spa.html

A Spanish and English dictionary.

Language lessons

Spanish Tongue Twisters: http://www.uebersetzung.at/twister/es.htm

88 Spanish language tongue twisters! With translations! Click on the number.
For Students of Language: http://www.geocities.com/~oberoi/language.html

Web sites for French, German, English Italian and Spanish language resources.
Foreign Languages for Travelers: http://travlang.com/languages/

Choose your native language then choose the langage you wish to learn. This website teaches the basics of many languages from around the world and provides sound clips so you can hear and learn the correct pronounciation.
German for Travellers: http://www.germanfortravellers.com/

Begin to learn German!
Free Online Language Courses: http://www.word2word.com/course.html

Learn a language online. Over 50 languages to choose from!
Say Hello to the World: http://www.ipl.org/div/kidspace/hello/

Learn foreign languages and about the different world cultures.
Learn Spanish: http://www.Studyspanish.com

RealPlayer plug-in required. [http://www.real.com/products/player/] 43 tutorials with audio allows you to listen and repeat words and phrases. About 30 cultural lessons, where a paragraph is read out loud as the students reads the screen. Three questions follow each paragraph to assist with reading comprehension. English versions of all pages are available to assist learning.
Web Spanish Lessons: http://www.june29.com/Spanish/

Language lessons that includes sound files so that students can hear how the words are pronounced and repeat them.

Quotations

Bartleby.com: Quotations: http://www.bartleby.com/quotations/

This website helps you find quotes and who said them.
Quoteland: http://www.quoteland.com/

Search for quotes by topic or identify a quote.

Quick Reference & World Facts

For U.S. and World populations, see also World Facts & Statistics

Everyday Mysteries: http://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/

Fun science facts from the Library of Congress
Fugitive Fact File: http://www.hclib.org/pub/search/fff_public.cfm

Hennepin County Library's fact file is now searchable on the Web.
Information Please: http://InfoPlease.com/

Dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs and lists of quick facts information!
Ready Reference Files: http://www.santacruzpl.org/cgi-bin/readyref.pl

The Santa Cruz Public Library now has a database of odd facts that can be searched.
The State of World population: http://www.unfpa.org/swp/

Text and PDF reports, fact charts, graphs, photographs and more.
The WorldWideWeb Acronym and Abbreviation Server: http://silmaril.ie/cgi-bin/uncgi/acronyms

What does NASA stand for? How about DARE? Find out here.
Worldtime: http://www.worldtime.com/

This interactive atlas also identifies sunset and sunrise times by city, zoom in and zoom out, and provides a database of public holidays.

Sign language dictionaries

ASL Pro Dictionaries: http://www.aslpro.com/cgi-bin/aslpro/aslpro

Type in the words you wish to spell and the website will illustrate how to fingerspell those words.
A Basic Dictionary of ASL Terms: http://www.masterstech-home.com/ASLDict.html

Learn sign language online!

Subject-specific dictionaries

ArtLex: http://www.artlex.com/

Over 1800 terms defined, many with illustrations, pronunciation notes, quotations, and links to other resources on the Web.
Cliché Finder: http://www.westegg.com/cliche/

Over 3,300 clichés indexed!
Dictionary of Symbolism: http://www.umich.edu/~umfandsf/symbolismproject/symbolism.html/

From the University of Michigan, this website is a list of the symbolism of objects and creatures commonly found in art and literature.

Time & calendars

Daylight Saving Time: http://webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/

Why do we change our clocks and when did this begin? Find out here.
A Walk Through Time: http://physics.nist.gov/GenInt/Time/time.html

The evolution of time measurement, including ancient calendars, early clocks, the atomic age, and more.