Digital Literacy: Searching the World Wide Web PDF

## Digital Literacy: Searching The World Wide Web ### 2. You Will Learn * How to find information on the web and describe sources. * How to choose information you find on the web and give reasons for your choices. * How web search engines select and show useful information. ### 2.1 Searching Th...

## Digital Literacy: Searching The World Wide Web ### 2. You Will Learn * How to find information on the web and describe sources. * How to choose information you find on the web and give reasons for your choices. * How web search engines select and show useful information. ### 2.1 Searching The Web #### Four Golden Rules 1. **Choose The Right Key Words** * Make a list of key words. * Underline the most important key words. 2. **Choose The Right Search Engine** * Try using different search engines. * Child-friendly search engines: * Links are easier to read and understand. * Less likely to see unsuitable web pages. * Fewer adverts. 3. **Bookmark Your Favourite Sites** * Add a web page to your bookmarks. * Bookmarks can be a good place to start a search. 4. **Try Again** * Try to think of different key words. * Will a different search engine give better results? * Will any of your bookmarked pages lead you to helpful information? ### 2.2 How Search Engines Work #### How Large Is The Web? * Lesson contains 500 words. * Complete book contains 25,000 words. * Pile of 76,000 books would contain 1.9 billion words. * Pile of books would be 400 metres tall. (Half the height of the world's tallest building, Burj Khalifa) #### How Does A Search Engine Work? * Search engines use a powerful computer to look for matches to your key words. * Search engine would take very long to search 1.9 billion websites - they use **spiders** and **web crawlers** to help. * **Spiders** crawl around the web to collect information. * Every word on the page is recorded. * The spider count how many times each word is used. * **Search Engine Index** * Information is stored in a special list called an **index**. * The index is searched when you enter a search question. * The search engine compares each key word to the words in it. * It ignores short joining words like 'the', 'what', 'why'. * **Algorithms** * Algorithms are used to choose the web pages to answer your question. ### 2.3 Search Results #### How Many Pages? * The web contains 1.9 billion websites. * A search engine will find many matching pages. #### How A Search Engine Sorts Results * **How Popular Is A Page?** The most popular web pages are shown on the first page of search results. * **How Up To Date Is A Page?** Web pages that change often are shown near the top of the search results. * **Can The Website Be Trusted?** Websites that a search engine trusts are shown near the top of the list. #### Other Considerations * **Which pages have you looked at before?** A web browser keeps a list of websites you have looked at. * **Adverts** * Most search engines show adverts at the top of the list. * **Meta Tags** * Meta tags describe a web page. * Search engines see them and can use them to decide where to place a page in the list. ### 2.4 Choosing Web Content #### Can You Trust Web Content? * Check the checklist to ensure the content is correct, reliable, and relevant: 1. **Who wrote the content?** * Websites that belong to governments, charities, universities, or other large organizations are usually reliable sources of information. * Was the writer's name or job title included? Are there contact details? 2. **Is the content up to date?** * When was the web page last updated? * Consider how quickly technology changes. 3. **Is the page appropriate for your age?** * Is the content too complicated or simple for you to understand? * Is the language appropriate? 4. **Is the content relevant?** * Does the page answer your search question? 5. **Does the page give you facts or opinions?** * **Facts:** Can you check if they are true? * **Opinions:** Can you decide if you agree or disagree with them? ### 2.5 Giving Credit #### What Is Copyright? * Copyright means that you own your work. * It protects you from other people copying your work. * You must ask the copyright owner for permission to use or share their work. * You must say who created the work when sharing it, even if you received permission to share it. #### Using Other People's Work In Your School Work * Check with your teacher to make sure it is OK to use some of someone else's work. * Always give credit to the person who created the work. #### Giving Credit For Work You Use * Information to include when giving credit: * Author * Title of the article * Website * Date the work was created or date you accessed the website #### Using Photos In Your Work * Some photographers and artists use creative commons licenses to allow people to use their work free of charge. * Search for ‘creative commons images’ using a web search. Remember to include a credit. #### Plagiarism * Plagiarism is when you pretend that another person’s work is your own. * Always credit another person’s work. ### 2.6 Web Challenge * Work in a team to create a set of fact sheets on a chosen topic: (examples: famous scientists, football teams, popular singers, capital cities, endangered species.) #### Steps 1. **Plan your work.** * Choose a topic. * Divide the work between team members. * Design your fact sheets. 2. **Choose websites.** * Find a relevant website. * Decide together which websites you will use. 3. **Collect your facts.** * Research the information. * Copy and paste the information into a blank word processor document. 4. **Create your fact sheets.** * Transfer the information into a fact sheet. * Make sure your sheets look the same. ### Check What You Know * Review the knowledge you've learnt: * How to find information on the web and describe sources. * How to choose information you find on the web and give reasons for your choices. * How web search engines select and show useful information. ### Test * Look at the picture (a screenshot of a web search engine) and answer the questions. ### Activities * Carry out a web search to find information about the wildlife in China. * Answer the questions below: * List key words used in the search. * Write down two pieces of information. * List three websites you found useful. * Which website did you choose as the best? * Give reasons why you chose the website. ### Self-Evaluation * Did you: * Answer test questions 1 and 2? * Complete activities 1 and 2? * Answer test questions 1-4? * Complete activities 1-4? * Answer all the test questions? * Complete all the activities? * Re-read parts of this unit that you are unsure about. Try the test and activities again if you have time.