Teaching Students to Effectively Use the Internet. A search engine is essentially a database that points to Web sites and Internet resources. The search engine database is compiled by means of often called spiders, crawlers, or bots. These spiders, crawlers and bots are programmed to find web pages, follow all the links they contain and add any new information they find to the master database. It is important to remember that when you are using a search engine, you are not really searching the entire Internet, but a database of pages and resources from the Internet compiled by the bots. Once the information has been collected by the robot programs it is turned over to the search engine's indexing program. An helps to establish access points to the information collected by the robot programs and indicates these access points in the database.
All of this information is presented to your by means of the search engine's , the actual web page you see when you enter your query. Search engines are only as smart as the questions you ask. Evaluating Web Pages: Techniques to Apply & Questions to Ask. 1. What can the URL tell you? Techniques for Web Evaluation : 1. Before you leave the list of search results -- before you click and get interested in anything written on the page -- glean all you can from the URLs of each page. 2. 2. 1. INSTRUCTIONS for Truncating back a URL: In the top Location Box, delete the end characters of the URL stopping just before each / (leave the slash).
Continue this process, one slash (/) at a time, until you reach the first single / which is preceded by the domain name portion. 3. Check the date on all the pages on the site. 3. 1. What kinds of publications or sites are they? Are they real? 3. Expect a journal article, newspaper article, and some other publications that are recent to come from the original publisher IF the publication is available on the web. Look at the bottom of such articles for copyright information or permissions to reproduce. 4. 1. A. Type or paste the URL into alexa.com's search box. B. 1. 2. 5. 1. 2. WHY? Knowing What's What and What's Not: The 5 Ws (and 1 "H") of Cyberspace.
7 Google Search Techniques You Don’t Know Exist. Google search is a powerful tool...sometimes more powerful than you realize! Are you taking advantage of some of the lesser-known Google search techniques? Here are a few of my favorites... SafeSearch It's surprising how many people don't know about Google SafeSearch! SafeSearch filters allow you to modify your browser settings so that inappropriate content does not display in search results. Word Definitions To quickly pull up the definition of a word, use "define:" followed by the word. Example: define:webinar Numeric Ranges Useful if you're looking for information that relates to a range of numbers (such as a price range or years). Example: television 1950...1960 Phone numbers Curious who keeps calling your cellphone and not leaving a message? Example: phonebook:555-555-5555 Excluding words or phrases If you're looking for something a little more obscure, narrow down your search results by asking Google to omit certain results by using the "-" symbol.
Example: Florida vacation -Disney -Kimberly. Ten Steps to Better Web Research. Last fall I published Beyond Google which examines fifteen tools and strategies for getting students to look beyond the first two pages of Google search results. This morning I found through Kevin Jarrett a great presentation that complements my ebook. Teaching the Ten Steps to Better Web Research is a Slideshare presentation created by Mark Moran and Shannon Firth at Dulcinea Media. Dulcinea Media is the producer of Sweet Search a search engine for students. The presentation includes some statistics about students' search strategies (or lack thereof) that all educators should be aware of. Word Order Matters (1MM #8) Febuary 22, 2013. Search Education – Google.
ABCs of Web Literacy: Interactive Tutorial.