Some students will know these terms, others won’t. Need to establish a common base of knowledge before beginning class. Go ahead and ask if anyone knows, then regardless of who answers- whether they are correct or not- review the definition for each word.
URL - Universal Resource Locator Link/ Hyperlink - (computing) an instruction that connects one part of a program or an element on a list to another program or list Browser Window - The window on your screen in which the browser displays its information. One browser may have several windows "open" at once. You can click between them by clicking on the taskbar. Address Bar - Displays URL for current Web page, and allows entry of a URL to open in the document window. Web Page - A document written in HTML that can be accessed on the Internet. Every Web page has a unique address called a URL. Web pages can contain text, graphics, and hyperlinks to other web pages and files. Web Site - A collection of "pages" or files linked together and available on the World Wide Web. Web sites are provided by companies, organizations and individuals. Domain- Segment of an address that specifies an organization, its type, or its country of origin. Search Engine - A tool that enables users to locate information on the World Wide Web. Search engines use keywords entered by users to find Web sites which contain the information sought. Some search engines are specifically designed to find Web sites intended for children. Boolean Search - A search allowing the inclusion or exclusion of documents (finds) containing certain words through the use of operators such as AND, NOT and OR. Boolean logic refers to the logical relationship among search terms, and is named for the British-born Irish mathematician George Boole.
Create two or three person teams so you have at least 4 teams. Assign the list to each team but have two teams starting at the top of the list and the other two start at the bottom. Ask class for one of the words on the list to use as demonstration. “Which one do you want me to look up?” Check for understanding. Then ask class to continue with exercise.
Draw 2 large spider webs of search engines intersecting some strands but not others. Name one web Google, the other Yahoo. Draw spider at apex of each web and talk about how search engines work. (Basically, they are programs that are written by people to determine how to send the ‘bots’ (spiders) out into the ‘web’ to capture information at a predetermined interval that is then brought back to its web /company database). Draw large dots on some intersections of the webs and explain that these are the pages common to both search engines’ databases. Point out the strands that don’t intersect and draw large dots, explaining that these are the pages that are unique to that search engine- it was not captured by both…
Briefly go to the links to show view of how these engines appear. (Bradley, 2003) Free text search engines- simply type in any term, phrase or word which takes your fancy Index search engines: These engines will guide you through your search by providing you with a series of headings, and subheadings until you finally reach a list of sites. Very useful if you want a broad overview of what is available within a specific subject area, although you are constrained by the classification scheme which is in use, so you may have to go up and down the subject trees a few times until you find exactly what it is that you're after. (example- http://www.allsearchengines.com/) Multi-search engines: These search engines are bolted on front ends to a number of other Internet search engines. Natural Language engines: They take the natural language query, and run searches on those words and other related words Site/subject specific : These are appropriate to either a specific site or to a specific database, and they will only search that specific data. Different search engines rank their results based on different criteria. Some engines will show you the percentage of similarity between your search terms and their results. Others will rank their results based on how many people go to that page. Discuss sponsored vs. non-sponsored links.
Who knows these sites? What types do you think they are? Metacrawler; multi-search Google- free text Yahoo- directory About.com- Index Ask.com/Teoma free text Subject- Specific Popularity (Subject-Specific Popularity ranks a site based on the number of same-subject pages that reference it, not just general popularity.)
Elicit conversation and input from class
Enter site:prescottaz.com classifieds into search window site:edu Yavapai Yavapai site:edu OR site:gov Add filetype:pdf These could be entered at the same time into your search engine
Talk about how search engines work on key terms. Example: searching for pink floyd will bring up pages with not only ‘pink floyd’, but also all those that have just ‘pink’ and just ‘floyd’ or any combination. Using quotes tells the search engine that you want pages that contain all the words enclosed in the quotes as one phrase and together.
Searching in a site specific search engine Limiting search to one site Analyze results…
To use Boolean terms, go to advanced search- look for Boolean search field and enter search criteria there. Review quotes
Open 3 browser windows: Start Internet Explorer Go to and then select File--> New Window Repeat Go to and then select File--> New Window without closing any windows You will now have three windows open at the same time Enter 3 different search engine URLs Choose from (or select your own) Metacrawler http://www.metacrawler.com/ Google http://www.google.com/ Yahoo http://dir.yahoo.com/ About.com http://about.com/ Teoma http://www.teoma.com/ Statistics say no search engine has it all: Only about 60% of pages in Google are also in other search engines Only 50% of pages in any search engine database are also found in all others www.searchengineshowdown.com/stats/ Use another large search engine
Open 3 browser windows: Start Internet Explorer Go to and then select File--> New Window Repeat Go to and then select File--> New Window without closing any windows You will now have three windows open at the same time Enter 3 different search engine URLs Choose from (or select your own) Metacrawler http://www.metacrawler.com/ Google http://www.google.com/ Yahoo http://dir.yahoo.com/ About.com http://about.com/ Teoma http://www.teoma.com/ Statistics say no search engine has it all: Only about 60% of pages in Google are also in other search engines Only 50% of pages in any search engine database are also found in all others www.searchengineshowdown.com/stats/ Use another large search engine
Career Skills Program http://www2.yc.edu/content/careerskills/ Contact Us: 717.7920 (in Yavapai County) - or - 1.877.772.5701 ext. 7920