Post Graduate Diploma in Pre and Primary Teachers Training

Phase - 26

Integrating Technology in the Classroom

Surfing the Internet

Welcome to Internet Basics! Let us check out some of the great Web resources that
are available to you and your students with the click of a mouse. You may already be
familiar with some common Internet search techniques, but today we'll go over some
helpful hints for customizing your searches and discuss four search tools that are
particularly helpful. It's important to keep in mind that the Internet contains many
inappropriate sites for students, so
we'll also talk about the importance of
safety in Web browsing.

And of course, hand in hand with your

classroom Internet exploration come a
lot of great Web sites specifically
designed for your students. You also
need to know that with too many
online resources you may lose track of
them. So you need to be organized and
save your favorite Web sites as
bookmarks using the Favorites feature
of your Internet browser. These can be
used as bookmarks in the lesson plans
to create safe Internet searches for our
students.

We have a lot of interesting Web sites to explore that will actually be an invaluable
aid in the teaching process.

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Chapter 2

Searching the Internet

The Internet has become one of the most important

resources in the world, and it's crucial that all students
have safe access to its information. But sometimes this is
easier said than done.

Ideally, the computer lab should be the hub for Internet

information and technology integration across the grade levels. If this isn't possible at
your school, try to use the classroom work station as the hub.

Internet Search Tools

As a teacher, you may already have a favorite way

to search the Internet. Perhaps you have a
preferred search engine or directory. If you were
to compare Google (a search engine) to Yahoo!
Directory (one of the first service that Yahoo
offered), you would see that the entire layout of
these Web sites is different. For example, Google
has a large area to type in a few keywords while
Yahoo! Directory is set up with directory listings
right on the front page. In both cases, large
databases store information about Web sites, but
they differ in the method used to find information.

Search Engine

You're probably familiar with Bing and Google, which are popular search engines.
A search engine works by indexing each word within all or parts of a document. When
you request a query to a search engine, your keywords are matched to Web sites on
the Internet, and a list of relevant pages appears. Search engines are suited for
difficult topic areas where it would be best to use a specific group of keywords to find
information in Web sites.

A great example of a difficult topic area suitable for a search engine would be "guinea
pig eating habits." However, you could find general guinea pig information just as
easily with a directory search, simply by typing guinea pig. Just remember that there

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are millions of documents available on the Web. A single search may find only 30-40%
of the available, relevant information.

Directory

You may be unfamiliar with the term directory. A directory is an Internet query tool
managed by trained professionals who organize useful Web sites into a hierarchical,
subject-based structure. Yahoo! Directory is an example of a directory search tool.
Yahoo! has now expanded its offerings and opens up displaying a search engine page.
To use the directory, you'll have to click the down arrow in the search field to
display Directory or here's the address to take you there:

http://search.yahoo.com/dir

When you do a keyword search, the directory looks through descriptions of the Web
sites it has in its database. Every time it finds a word or phrase you're searching for,
you'll receive a hit. For this reason, a directory engine finds many Web sites, but the
information in these sites may or may not be exactly what you're looking for.

Effective Search Techniques

Sometimes it might seem easier to go to only one Web site when searching for
information on a specific topic. And one may have a tendency to use a favorite search
tool every time—for most it is Google. But, the abundance of information available on
a site like Google is overwhelming, especially for students who have a tendency just
to pick the first search result. For example, if you typed French Revolution in Google,
you would receive well over 100 million matches. Obviously, this is too much
information for anyone to
digest, especially students!

So, when you or your students

search for student-friendly
Web sites, the following tips
may help you narrow down
your search and keep them
away from too much
information or inappropriate
material. You can use these
tips on any search engine or
directory, including Google and Yahoo!

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 1. Use plus (+) or minus (-) signs in front of words to force their inclusion or
exclusion in searches. For example, you could enter + reading+ elementary or
you could enter + reading+ secondary.
2. Use double quotation marks (" ") around phrases to ensure they are searched
exactly as is, with the words side by side in the same order, like this: "the
President of the United States". Don't put quotation marks around one word.
3. Use six to eight keywords, and put your most important keywords first in the
string. For example: elementary school reading writing curriculum.
4. Type keywords and phrases in lowercase to find both lower and uppercase
versions. Typing capital letters will usually return only an exact match.

Internet Safety in Education

Before you get ready to perform extensive searches in your classroom, let's pause for
a moment and talk about Internet safety. The Internet is a huge collection of
knowledge, and because it's so accessible to adults and children alike, it's important
to filter your students' Web browsing. As an educator, you have the monumental task
of keeping your students safe on the Information Superhighway. This will take some
time and effort on your part, so I want to give you just the right tools for safe
traveling with your students.

As you probably know, there is a critical distinction between student access and
student learning. For learning to occur, access needs to be aligned to curriculum
objectives rather than just random Web surfing. Otherwise, you'll find that access is
actually a distraction to the learning process. Students also need constant supervision
just in case bad sites are not blocked or filtered out by an Internet filtering system.

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CIPA

One act designed to keep our students safe while online is

the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA). The federal
government requires each state to comply with the
Children's Internet Protection Act to receive federal
dollars called E-Rate, which are applied toward schools'
yearly telecommunications bills. CIPA requires that all
public schools have Internet filtering software installed to
prevent access to visual depictions of material that is
obscene, pornographic, or otherwise harmful to minors.

Based on the CIPA law, your district may already be using

one of the many Internet filtering products available for
purchase. As a teacher within a district, you may not be
aware that these safeguards are in place at the district level, but you'll find, upon
further hunting, that Internet viewing within your school is monitored by either your
technology department or state department. They make every effort to block all
inappropriate sites. However, millions of new sites spring up daily, so don't rely on
these filters to do the job for you!

But don't worry. In addition to all the inappropriate sites out there, the Internet also
offers a wealth of educational sites that are excellent learning tools for your
students. Let's take a look.

Chapter 3

Safe, Student-Friendly Search Tools

Again, the first thing you need to remember when Web surfing with your students is
to narrow down the focus of their Internet searches. Otherwise, students will spend a
large portion of their computer time looking for Web sites, rather than actually
exploring the content.

So, in this chapter, we'll look at search engines, directories, and reference resources
designed particularly for the younger generation. And by the end of this chapter,
you'll be able to steer your students safely through the maze that is the Internet.

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With all students, it's particularly important to use search tools that are appropriate
for their curriculum level. So let's look at four search tools that provide excellent
resources for teachers and their students.

We'll talk about:

Web Site URL

Yahoo! Kids http://kids.yahoo.com/

KidsClick! http://www.kidsclick.org/

The American Library Association Great Web

http://www.ala.org/greatsites
site for Kids

Ask for Kids http://www.askforkids.com

These sites are a lot of fun for you and your students.

Yahoo Kids!

Yahoo! Kids is a directory-style search tool. It provides links with titles

like Games and Music. It also has a link to Study Zone that takes students to the
Yahoo! Learn site. On this page, each of these links will take you to a page about that
particular topic, with polls, news, and popular Web sites. For example, if you were to
click Science, you would find items like a science and nature slideshow, a space poll,
and links to resources about space and dinosaurs. You'll also see the Yahoo! Kids
Directory that includes all kinds of directories to help students with their schoolwork
within each directory, you'll find great content and links that make learning fun for
your students.

If you're not sure what directory to look in, there's also a search feature that allows
you to type in a keyword or phrase. The entire Yahoo! Kids site will search for any
results. For example, typing William Shakespeare, will open up to tons of

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resources on William Shakespeare's plays.
I'll be the first to admit that high school DMOZ
students aren't going to be thrilled
starting

out at any site that has the

word kid anywhere on it. However, even
though they may protest, these sites will
help them find the resources that they Web address dmoz.org
need, and frankly, their complaining is not
as bad as having objectionable content
pop up on a computer screen in the Slogan Open Directory Project
middle of a class lesson.
Commercial? No
Try typing in your own keywords and see
what classroom-related resources you
come up with! Type of site Web directory

www.dmoz.org/Kids_and_Teens/Directori Registration Optional

es
Available in 90, including English

Users ~90,000

Content Open Directory

license License,Creative Commons
Attribution 3.0 Unported

Owner AOL, formerly Netscape

Launched June 5, 1998; 16 years ago

Alexa rank 868 (April 2014)[1]

Kids Click! is a Web directory librarians built just for kids. Be sure, however, that you
type in org instead of com when you key in the address.

It includes over 600 subjects categorized by subject or letter. Some examples include:

 Facts and Reference

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  Science & Math
 Literature
 Reading, Writing, & Speaking
 Machines & Transportation
 Geography/History/Biography
 The Arts

Each subject contains a list of appropriate Web sites for students. For example, when
you click theEncyclopedia link, it identifies 10 sites. Each listing includes a summary
and suggested reading level, which helps you gauge grade-level appropriateness.

I clicked on Science and then Chemistry and found some great resources about the
periodic table, including a really interesting comic book with elements as heroes.

And if you're looking for particular information, you can enter keywords in the search
field, and it will search the whole directory for relevant information.

The American Library Association Great Web Sites for Kids

The American Library Association (ALA) has created and currently maintains a
student-friendly Web site. Like Kids Click!, this site is made of directories that are
also organized by subject.

If you click a subject, you'll be brought to a page with relevant sites labeled with
colored pencils to indicate the grade-level appropriateness. A green pencil site is
appropriate for pre-K, a red pencil is appropriate for elementary, a blue pencil is
appropriate for middle school, and a yellow pencil is appropriate for parents,
teachers, and caregivers. While they, unfortunately, did not include a high school
category, many of the middle school sites are great for the high school level.

If you prefer to search the directories, click the large picture called Search Great
Web Sites for Kids. When you click here, a search page will open in your browser,
allowing you to search using one of three criteria:

 Intended Audience: Pre-K Parents, Teachers, or Caregivers.

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  Keywords: Type in a subject or curriculum area. For example, I
typed dinosaur. The search found 14 appropriate sites for pre-K and
elementary-aged youth.

 URL: If you want to check whether a Web site is included in the ALA Great Sites
database, type its URL here.

You also have the option to submit additional URLs to the ALA. Go to their home page
and click the link Suggest a Great Web site for Kids to send your recommendation to
the ALA. This is a fun way to share your resources with teachers across the world.

Ask for Kids

Students really like this Web site because it lets them ask questions by simply typing
them into a box. When they click Search, students are brought to another page that
lists Web sites with the answer they're seeking. All of the Web sites that appear are
already filtered for appropriateness.

If you go back to the main page, you'll see two links called Fun and Games and News
Resources. If you click one of these, you'll be taken to a page with links to related
Web sites. Finally, students can access a dictionary, thesaurus, almanac, and get help
in a variety of academic subjects.

Customizing Existing Search Engines

There is one more tool to help you filter those search results. Did you know that you
can set the filtering level on most search engines?

If you go to Google's Preferences page at www.google.com/preferences, you'll be able

to set a strict filtering level.

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Likewise, if you use AltaVista at www.altavista.com, once you locate the search field
box, click the word More, and then choose Preferences. Then you'll be able to
change your family filter settings.

Reference Sites for Students

In addition to these great search tools, the Web has a lot of reference tools for
students and their teachers. Here are a few that you may want to explore.

Web Site URL

Little http://www.enchantedlearning.com/Dictionary.html
Explorer's
Dictionary

Roget's II http://www.bartleby.com/62/

Columbia http://www.bartleby.com/65/
Encyclopedia

Kids Image http://www.kidsclick.org/psearch.html

Search Tools

Discovery http://school.discovery.com/clipart
School Clip
Art

Fact Monster http://www.factmonster.com

National http://www.nationalgeographic.com/kids/
Geographic
for Kids

Time for http://www.timeforkids.com

Kids

Kids News http://www.kidsnewsroom.org

Room

Yak's Corner http://www.yakscorner.com

Colombia http://www.bartleby.com/nonfiction/
Nonfiction

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 Anthologies

Famous http://www.bartleby.com/quotations/
Quotes

Merriam http://www.m-w.com
Webster's
Dictionary

American http://factfinder.census.gov/home/saff/main.html
Fact Finder

National http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/mapmachine/index.html
Geographic's
Map Machine

The Citation
http://citationmachine.net/
Machine

By now, you've probably found a ton of Web sites that you'd like to use in your
teaching and to share with your students. Great! In the next chapter, we'll learn
about how to organize these Web sites using bookmarks and how to then transfer the
bookmarks to your lesson plans.

Chapter 4

Bookmarks and Lesson Planning

Many a times you are at a risk of losing some of your favorite Web sites, so to help
you organize all this new information, let's talk about bookmarks. Then we'll consider
how to incorporate bookmarks into lesson plans. Don't worry! It's not hard to do.

Creating Bookmarks

A bookmark is a Web site location that is saved in the Favorites area of your Internet
browser. The Favorites link is located on the toolbar of Internet Explorer or Netscape
Navigator. To find Favorites, please open your Internet browser.

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Adding a bookmark to Favorites is a simple thing to do. When you find a Web site that
you'd like to keep, click Favorites and select Add or Add to favorites. The Web page
address, or URL, of that site will be saved for future access.

The only drawback is that if you use Favorites a lot, you'll soon get a very long list of
bookmarks. This can become cumbersome. I like to use the Folder option and save
bookmarks in areas of interest. For example, I have created folders within Favorites
called Teachers, Students, Social Studies,English,Spanish, Reading, Writing, Math,
and Science. To add a math bookmark, simply click Add, locate the Math folder, and
click OK.

If you'd like to develop some new folders of your own, all you need to do is select the
words New Folder. Then you'll be prompted with directions to name your new folder.

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You may want to save all of the URLs that are introduced in this lesson and in this
course because we've only just begun checking out the best of the best on the
Internet. Some ideas for folders include: Internet Search Tools from Class, Reference
Sites for Students, News Sites for Students, and Clip Art for Free. After creating the
folder, feel free to add any appropriate Web sites to it. That way you can continue to
amass your list of helpful sites long after this lesson is over. Have fun.

Using Bookmarks in Lesson Plans

Now that you know a little more about bookmarks, think of how important it is to
integrate them into your lesson plans. It is suggested to put the Web site URLs for a
lesson directly into the Favorites list on the computer students will be using. This
saves them having to type in a long URL. Just one mistake in the typing can hinder
students' efforts to reach a site, which means that they'll become frustrated easily.

For older students, a mini-lesson on creating Favorites folders is recommended. This

is a great activity because it will help your students learn how to organize information
and how to save their own bookmarks under their own names.

You can introduce Internet searching to your students by asking them to go to Yahoo!
Kids and search for pictures of animals. Have your students find pictures of three
types of animals and ask them to save the bookmarks for each picture in a Favorites
folder called Animals.

Or you could even ask your students to visit Google after you've modified the filter
settings. They could search for images of cell division. Have your students find three
pictures of cell division and save them in a Favorites folder called Cell Division.

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Chapter 5

Summary

In this lesson, Internet resources designed especially for students was discussed.
These sites have targeted content that is age appropriate, eliminating the heavy
searching and guesswork on your part. It was discussed how to create bookmarks,
make folders, and add bookmarks to a folder.

The underlying principle of this lesson is to help you understand how important it is to
have structured lesson plans using Web content. It's important to keep inappropriate
content away from your students and use appropriate search engines and student-
approved Web sites.

FAQ

Q: What is the difference between a search engine and a search tool?

A: A search engine is only one type of search tool. But there are many search
tools available on the Internet. For example, a directory is also a type of a
search tool. People often use the term search engine to categorize all types of
Internet searches, but the preferred term is tool.

Supplementary Material

Bare Bones 101: A Basic Tutorial on Searching the Web

http://www.sc.edu/beaufort/library/pages/bones/bones.shtml

This link will take you to the USC-Beaufort Library Web site, which has a tutorial on
search engines and search engine strategies.

CIPA

http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/cipa.html

Here's the place to go to learn more about the Children's Internet Protection Act

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