SESSION 3 EDC920 (You should hear audio narration)

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Session 6 Continuation of Search Tools
How to use search engines effectively in the
classroom.
This workshop islicensed under a Creative
Commons License.
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Developing a Web Search Strategy

• Decide if the question is specific or
  exploratory.
• Formulate and state the question.
• Select the appropriate Web search tool.
• Evaluate the search results.
• Repeat the previous steps until you find the
  answer.

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Specific Question

• A specific question is a question that you can
  phrase easily and one which you will recognize
  the answer when you find it.
• In other words, you will know when to end your
  search.

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Specific Questions (cont.)

• Require you to start with broad categories of
  information and then to gradually narrow the
  search.
• Example
• What is the population of Bolivia?
• Start with World population statistics
• South America population statistics
• Population of Bolivia

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Exploratory Question

• An exploratory question is an open-ended question
  that can be harder to phrase and harder to
  determine when it has been answered successfully.
• Exploratory questions start with general
  questions that lead to other, less general
  questions.

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Exploratory Question (cont.)

• The answers to the questions at each level should
  lead you to more information about the topic you
  are researching.

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Exploratory Question (cont.)

• Example
• What caused the Great Depression?
• What events are associated with the Great
  Depression?
• What caused the events to occur?
• What conditions led to these causes?

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Narrowing a Search

• Narrow a Web search by doing the following
• Add keywords.
• Use restricting keywords.
• Use phrases.
• Use Boolean modifiers.
• Search for specific media.

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Narrowing a SearchUsing Restricting Keywords

• A restricting keyword places limits on the
  results your search engine returns. They are best
  to use when your initial search term is specific
  enough, but has more than one common meaning.

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• For example
• -The term ivy could refer to a type of plant or a
  group of colleges. When searching for information
  about the plant, you would more likely find your
  desired results by using the phrase ivy
  college than the term ivy alone. The minus
  sign eliminates all results with the word
  college.

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Narrowing a SearchAdding Keywords

• In situations where a search term is very broad,
  there may be too many irrelevant concepts to
  exclude them effectively using restricting
  words. Therefore, Adding keywords is the
  better technique when your initial search term is
  broader than the object of your search.
• For example, if you are looking for information
  about controlling weeds in your yard, the search
  term weed is too broad. Something like weed
  control would be more appropriate.

WEED CONTROL
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Searching for a Phrase

• The most common way to instruct a search engine
  to find a set phrase is to use quotation marks,
  for example "vegetable garden." If you select
  the right phrase, your results will not only be
  fewer in number but also more relevant.

VEGETABLE GARDEN
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Phrasing (continued)

• Today I had a student that quickly wanted to know
  the last name of a character in The Secret Life
  of Bees. She typed in the title and received
  819,000 hits. I suggested that she place quotes
  around the title--then add the first characters
  first name.

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Boolean Operators

• Also called logical operators
• A Boolean operator specifies the logical
  relationship between two elements it joins.
• Examples are
• AND
• OR
• NOT
• Search engines have become more sophisticated and
  do not require Boolean Operators, but a few still
  do.

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Examples of Boolean Operators

• Search Expression examples
• Pets AND Dogs
• Pets AND (Dogs OR Cats)
• Pets OR (Dogs AND Cats)
• Pets NOT Cats
• Pets OR Dogs

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Using Boolean Operators

• More complex search questions require more
  complex queries.
• You can broaden or narrow your search expression
  by using
• Boolean logic
• Search expression operators

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Advanced Searches

• Each search engine follows different rules and
  offers different features.
• To obtain help for a particular search engine,
  examine its home page and look for a hyperlink to
  Help pages.
• HotBot provides a step-by-step process for
  conducting an advanced search.

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Troubleshooting Failed Searches

• Specifically, you should do the following when
  you receive few or no hit results
• Check spelling.
• Attempt to overcome page-loading errors.
• Assure use of the appropriate search tool.

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Checking Spelling

• Misspelling search terms is one of the most
  common causes of search failure. It may seem
  obvious, but make sure you double-check your
  spelling the next time your search comes up
  empty.

Liberry
-
Library
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Handling Page Errors

• When I click on one of the links listed I may get
  an error that says "Page Not Found." Sometimes,
  even when you seem to have received great search
  results, you get an error like this when you
  click one of the links.
• These errors are most likely because
• (1) the server that hosts the page isn't working
  properly, or
• (2) the page itself has been removed, or
• (3) there's a character of the URL missing.

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• When you do get an error like this, you have
  options. You can either try the page again at a
  later time or, try deleting parts of the URL
  until you get a page to load. Once you get a page
  to load, you can use the links on that page to
  find the information you want.

http//www.projo.com/blogs/
http//www.projo.com/
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Assuring Appropriate Search Tools

• Search engines are very effective at locating a
  large number of sites. If you need specialized
  information a better choice might be a search
  directory that focuses on one topic. The most
  important thing to remember is to match your
  searches with the right search tools.

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Searching for Specific Media

• Some search engines offer the ability to search
  for specific media types. Google has a tab on its
  first page that presents a search field
  specifically for sites with images.

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Hypermedia
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• The Internet supports many different formats of
  information
• Text files
• Pictures
• Photographs
• Sound files
• Video files

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LINK
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Also try these locations

• Merlot
• Connexions
• Internet Archive
• Creative Commons
• OpenDOAR
• Curriki
• Hippocampus
• More Content Sources

• OER Commons
• FREE Federal Resources for Educational
  Excellence
• COL Knowledge Finder
• Edu2.0

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Also, see Discipline-Specific Content
Sources, OER Public Domain Textbook Sources, and
textbooks listed at OER Commons.
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Multiple Language Choices
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• OPTIONAL
• Read "Where to Find Public-domain and other Free
  Works