The World Book (Encyclopedia) Student Online [electronic resource] offers research tools, biography information, geographical information, quizzes and activities, images and videos. These resources are helpful for students in grades K-12, and can provide valuable resources for homework assignments.

Signing in is possible on your home computer using your library card Barcode and Pin number. If you need help signing in call the reference librarian at your nearest library. 

English World Book

http://0-www.worldbookonline.com.catalog.sjlibrary.org/student/home

Spanish World Book

http://0-www.worldbookonline.com.catalog.sjlibrary.org/eeh/home

Looking up health information online is daunting, and you may find yourself searching through a sea of good, bad and incomplete information. What to believe?

It may give you some peace of mind to know that your San Jose Public Library card gives you access to the following subscription health information databases. You can access these databases at any SJPL branch or at home by entering your library card and PIN numbers. 

Consumer Health Complete

Covers all areas of health and wellness from mainstream medicine to holistic and integrated medicine. Includes topics such as aging, cancer, diabetes, drugs and alcohol, fitness, nutrition and dietetics, and children's health.

Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition

Articles on nursing and allied health.

Magill's Medical Guide Online

Are your kids always telling you last minute that they have a project on a Mission and when you get to the library all the books are checked out? Worry no more! The Missions of California Books are available in digital format online at sjpl.org. Go to our catalog and do a keyword search for "missions of california." Then click the link on the mission your child has to do report for then type "missions" for username and password and you're set. All the same information online ready for you at anytime.

San Jose Public Library is an exceptional city library system for many reasons – our outreach to San Jose's diverse, multicultural community and the award of last year's National Medal for Library Service certainly attest to this! Perhaps one of our most unique features is the fact that we are partnered with San Jose State University and a happy advantage of this academic partnership is, as a public library user, you are able to use SJSU’s wealth of information and even their databases –  if you physically go to Dr. King Library. 

However, if you would like to do scholarly research from home, there is no better tool than SJPL’s Academic Search Complete which you can search from home with your library card no. and PIN.  Having both peer-reviewed journals and popular magazines like Consumer Reports, Academic Search Complete is one of the world’s most comprehensive scholarly, multi-disciplinary full-text databases.  

So, if you are an SJPL user have an in-depth research project, don’t forget to look into Academic Search Complete as an excellent first stop.   

Bay Area Consumers' Checkbook is a magazine published twice a year (with occasional updates). Like Consumer Reports, it is nonprofit and unbiased and gives you advice on making wise decisions and choosing what's best for your needs. Unlike Consumer Reports, it evaluates local businesses and services rather than products. Their evaluations are based on subscriber surveys and are less sensational and inflammatory that what you will find on free-for-all websites (such as Yelp.com). They provide ratings on such topics as price, timeliness, customer service, etc.

San José Public Library does not subscribe to their website (www.checkbook.org) but we do provide back issues of their magazine at ten library locations. The King Library has five years worth of back issues, but the branches that have it typically keep six months to two years of back issues. Or you can subscribe to their print or online magazine for a fee from home.

Don’t have the time, money, or grades to go to Harvard? Well, there is now a myriad of free learning opportunities available online from top instructors and institutions across the world for just about every subject imaginable.

In the old days, the only free way to learn a new subject without was to check out a book at your local library. But if you’re anything like me, you probably can’t sit down and read a textbook cover-to-cover without experiencing a total brain shutdown. These online video courses offer a new, more engaging medium to help DIY learners master their desired subjects at their own pace and free of charge.

Here are a few free learning websites that are worth checking out:

• iTunes U - Free access to online courses from a large variety of top universities such as Stanford, MIT and Cornell. Requires iTunes (free to download).

• YouTube EDU - Another large collection of video lectures from various learning institutions. Search or browse by subject, university, or popularity.

• webcast.berkeley - A collection of free audio and video lectures from UC Berkeley.

• MIT OpenCourseWare - Nearly all of MIT’s courses are available free on this site, most with audio and/or visual components.

• Open Culture - A collection of links to free sources of cultural and educational media content including lectures, movies, audio books, and language courses.

• freevideolectures.com - A browsable collection of video lectures available on the web. Videos can be downloaded in a variety of formats as well as streamed directly from the site.

• LearnersTV - Another good place to browse a collection of online video courses.

• videolectures.net - A large collection of video lectures mostly taken from conferences and workshops, especially in the computer science field. Provides opportunities for interacting with other users.

• Academic Earth - A collection of free online courses from top universities, browsable by subject, instructor, or university.