Assignment 1: Web Basics and Introduction to Web Search Tools
Part 1. Basic Web Searching. How do search tools work? Do you get different results with different search tools?
STEP 1 Pick two Web search tools and one topic
Topic ideas for research (pick 1)
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Web Search Tools pick 2:
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Research a social issue
(examples:smoking, gun control, global warming, medical marijuana, renewable energy)
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Google
Ask
Yahoo
Bing
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Research a topic related to another class
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Research a personal interest such as:
Your career goals
Your college major
Your hobby
A health condition
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STEP 2. Develop your topic and a Search Strategy: Use the same topic and keywords in both search tools.
Develop your topic. Use more than one word!
Think about what you want to know about this topic and select and write down 2-5 "key words" that describe your search topic and what you want to learn about it. Use these words in your search. You can use the "related searches" suggested by the search tool, but remember to use those same words for your second search. Do not use just one word (e.g. basketball) because you will get too many results.
Run the same search in both web search tools.
STEP 3: Selecting and evaluating your results.
Review the WEBSITES in the RESULTS LIST.
For each search -- Examine the first 5-8 results* for each search and select the most relevant result.
*NOTE: If the search tool includes "sponsored matches", make sure you also look at some of the 'regular' results.
-- Make a print out of only the first page of the two results list - so I can see how you did your searches.
(use FILE - Print, select pages). Turn in this copy with your assignment
Complete a Web Page Checklist for both of the websites you selected (one from each search).
-- Make a print out of the main page of the Websites you describe in the checklist to turn in (so I can see what you were looking at).
STEP 4: Analyzing your research
Write at least one paragraph comparing the results of these searches.
Your analysis should discuss/answer at least these points:
- Describe your search strategy: list the names of the search tools you used and what key words you used for your searches (you must use the same words for both search tools).
- How many results were found (list the number of sites in the results list for each search)
- Discuss the relevance of the first 5 to 10 Websites in each results list. How well did these results match your topic?
- How similar are the results from the two search tools?
If the search tool includes "sponsored matches", make sure you also look at the 'regular' results list.
- Include any other observations you have about this research, these search tools or the results of these searches
Be prepared to ask and answer questions about your search results next week.
STEP 5 Saving information from the Web
- Select one of the websites you evaluated and save a copy.
Practice using "Save As" to save a copy of it to your memory stick as an html file (.html).
- Bring a USB flash drive with this file on it to the next class
- In class we will view your saved copy.
- NOTE: Make sure you understand the difference between "saving as a favorite" and "saving to disk".
Part 2: Join the Wiki and add your favorite web directories
Step 1: if you did not add yourself as a member of the wiki in class, do it now.
Step 2: Go to the “Web directories and metasites we explored” page (see navigation pane on the right) and edit it to include any 2 of the specialized directories listed in the textbook (pages 45-54).
updated by K. Goguen 8/2010
Comments (1)
Krista Goguen said
at 4:37 pm on Sep 3, 2010
Clarification: You do not need to look over the online reference tools listed in Chapter 6 (pages 159-193). I will remove that from the course outline. Please select from the directories listed in Chapter 2 (pages 45-54) for part 2 of this assignment.
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