Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
Exploring Computer Science - Grade 8
Unit: Human Computer Interaction
Lesson: Day 3 – Smart Searching
Summary of Lesson
Search engines and how they work are explored through trying various internet search techniques. A
selection of Internet resources that are useful for finding information are introduced as well as a
selection of Web 2.0 applications. Several websites are evaluated by using a rubric to determine if they
are “good” websites.
Standard
No standard for first day of course, teacher and peers introduction.
Computer Science Standards: http://csta.acm.org/Curriculum/sub/CurrFiles/CSTA_K-12_CSS.pdf - Level
2 Grades 6-9
Computing Practice and programming:
Navigate between webpages using hyperlinks and conduct simple searches using search engines.
DCPS CTE Standards: Employability Standards
Common Core Standards: grade 8: RI.1, RI.4, RI.10, W.4,
W.7, W.10, SL.1a, SL.1b, SL.1c,
SL.1d, SL.4, SL.6, L.6
NETS: 3a-d, 4b, 4c, 6b
Skills: Online information searching
Lesson Source: http://csta.acm.org/Curriculum/sub/CurrFiles/ECS_v4.pdf - page 36 (Days 5-7)
Objective
Students will be able to perform searches and explain how to refine searches to retrieve better information.
Students will be able to identify resources for finding information in addition to ranking based search engines.
Assessment
Smart Searching Exercise
Journal Writing: What do you believe is the most confusing about the definition of Computers? of Computing?
Questions and Answers
Classroom discussion
Essential Question
How can I find credible information on a specific topic?
Develop Student Understanding of the Importance of the Objective
Knowing how to find credible information online that is accurate, reliable and supported is important in every part
of our lives.
Connecting to Prior Knowledge
Ask students how they find information on the internet for school, home and entertainment.
List all these ways on the board for the class to review.
Warm-up
Time: 5
Write the words Search Engines and Directories on the Board. Ask students what they know about these two
technology terms.
Have students write the EQ, Objective and Word Wall in their writing journals.
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 1 of 6
Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
Check for Understanding:
Check for prior knowledge
Teacher Input / Introduction of New Material
1.
2.
3.
4.
Transition:
What are examples of each?
Time: 20
Do a search with the top three answers the students offered in the warm-up. (Hopefully, Google is one of
the top three)
Note the number of hits in the index that the search resulted.
Ask students if the number of hits in a search engine is a “good thing” when searching for information
online?
What is a “good thing” when looking for information?
Answer: Information that is accurate, reliable, credible and supported information.
5. Explain to students what a search engine is
Answer: Spider software - A spider is a program that visits Web sites and reads their pages and other
information in order to create entries for a search engine index. The major search engines on the Web all
have such a program, which is also known as a "crawler" or a "bot." Spiders are typically programmed to
visit sites that have been submitted by their owners as new or updated. Entire sites or specific pages can
be selectively visited and indexed. Spiders are called spiders because they usually visit many sites in
parallel at the same time, their "legs" spanning a large area of the "web." Spiders can crawl through a
site's pages in several ways. One way is to follow all the hypertext links in each page until all the pages
have been read. Examples are Google and Yahoo.
Found at http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/spider
6. Overemphasize that big numbers in search engine indexes are based on frequency-based ratings –
no rating on accuracy, reliability, credibility or support of information
7. What is a meta-search engine?
Answer: A search engine that queries other search engines and then combines the results that are
received from all. In effect, the user is not using just one search engine but a combination of many
search engines at once to optimize Web searching. For example, Dogpile and Altavista.
Found at http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/M/metasearch_engine.html
8. What would make search engines better at finding accurate, reliable, credible and supported
information?
9. What could make those types of decisions? Note: You want the students to come up with the
answer of HUMANS. Humans could make those subjective decisions.
10. In steps – Directories!
A Web directory organizes Web sites by subject, and is usually maintained by humans instead of
software. The searcher looks at sites organized in a series of categories and menus. These
collections of links are usually much smaller than search engines' databases, since the sites are
looked at by human eyes instead of by spiders. Examples are Yahoo Directory and DMOZ.
11. So what is the difference between a search engine and a directory?
Answer: A search engine, such as Yahoo! or Google, is an online tool that helps users of the World Wide
Web find the sites and information they're looking for. Most search engines use automated programs
(sometimes called spiders) to look for relevant information based on keywords entered by the user.
A directory, such as Yahoo! Directory, is a catalog of web sites organized by category to allow users to
easily browse for the information they need. Unlike search engines, which locate and display relevant
information based on a formula or algorithm using an automated software program, search directories
are organized by real people who discover new sites and relevant information by exploring the Web
themselves and by reviewing submitted sites.
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 2 of 6
Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
Check for Understanding:
Ask students to write in their journals the differences
between a search engine, a meta-search engine and a
directory. Which one would offer the most accurate,
reliable, credible and supported index of information?
Transition:
Let’s look at information where you are an expert.
Guided Practice
Time: 20
1. What helps us find information we are looking for online?
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Use quotes around words or phrases you want to find
Use specific words
What is smart strategic searching?
How to keep from getting a lot of results I don’t need
What to do when a search term can mean two different things
How to search for two different things at once
Choose a topic students would know a lot about in either school or locality.
Search for the topic using a search engine (Google or Bing). Note the number of hits. What kind of sites are
coming up in the index?
Do the search first without using quotation marks around multiple words your keywords. For
example, if keywords were Hershey Chocolate, we will search for Hershey Chocolate. Then search
using keywords “Hershey Chocolate” (with quotation marks). Notice the difference in the number of
hits.
Search for the same topic using a meta-search engine (Clusty or Dogpile). Note the number of hits. What
kind of sites are coming up on the index?
Search for the same topic using a directory (DMOZ or Google Directory or Yahoo Directory - it would be
good to choose the same directory of the search engine you chose to show the difference in the search and
index). Note the categories/topics to choose from and then the number of hits. What kind of sites are
coming up in the index?
Check for Understanding:
Students’ answers for index hits and their explanations of
why the difference in number of hits between all three
search tools and using quotation marks around multiple
keywords.
Transition:
Let’s try an experiment between these three online
search tools.
Independent Practice
Time: 25
Where are the smarter searching happening given:  directories should be the answer due to the human-based
factor!
1. Number of hits (many is not necessarily better)
2. Type of sites (directories should result in more credible sites)
3. Information on the sites (students will be able to make a judgment on this if they know about the topic)
4. Creators of the sites (reputable sources?)
Have students complete the Search Tool Hunt.
Check for Understanding:
Students’ searching data and analysis of the data
Transition:
Higher Level Questions - See Questions to Develop
Higher-Understanding listed below.
Closure
Time: 5
Journal Writing
Smart Searching makes online information finding Efficient and Effective.
Explain and Support this statement.
Check for Understanding:
Read students’ journal entries.
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 3 of 6
Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
Have students share their thoughts/writing.
Additional Lesson Plan Considerations
Connection to Unit Goals, Course Goals, and Essential Questions
Introduce lesson and see if anyone has prior knowledge or experience.
Ask students if they have heard the words Search engines, Meta Search Engines or Directories .
What is there experience with each?
Why do we search for information online?
Why is it important that the information that we find is accurate, reliable, supported and credible?
Key Points and Vocabulary to Emphasize
Search engines
Meta-search engines
Directories
Index
Credible
Spider software
Human-rated
Frequency-rated
Accessible to All Students (Modifications/Differentiation)
All resources will be on wikispaces until DCPS Blackboard site is up and running.
https://wiscountmths.wikispaces.com
Challenging to All Students (Modifications/Differentiation)
All resources will be on wikispaces until DCPS Blackboard site is up and running.
https://wiscountmths.wikispaces.com
Multiple Ways to Move Toward Mastery
Peer Share
Practice
Look at more examples of each term.
Potential Misunderstandings, Possible Scaffolding, and Probes for Correct Responses
Spider-based (mindless) software vs. human-factor decisions
Students are so used to using Google they may argue that it has resulted in good information for them in
the past.
Remind students that using directories is a smarter way to search due to the human factor.
Students may argue that Wikipedia is human-generated content, so why do most academic institutions
not allow students to use the site in their research.
Answer: The credibility of the contributors is unknown.
Questions to Develop Higher-Level Understanding
Why is it a good idea to try more than one search site?
Answer: No one search site covers the entire Web. Also, search sites offer different search options.
Have students visit:
Google – How Search Works? http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/insidesearch/howsearchworks/thestory/
Google Tips and Tricks for Searches
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 4 of 6
Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/insidesearch/tipstricks/
Google Search Playground
http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/insidesearch/playground/
Extra for Experts:
Boolean operator use in searching (great understanding with Venn diagrams) http://knowledgecenter.unr.edu/help/using/booltips.aspx
More Search operators - https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/136861?hl=en
Extension Activity
Assign students to work in groups to play “A Google a Day” (http://agoogleaday.com/#game=started),
an online search game in which one tries to find the answer to a complex search question from a myriad
of topics. Points go down the longer one takes! Encourage students to use their five-step search plans.
Extension Lesson Plan on Strategic Searching
1.
What is smart strategic searching?
How to keep from getting a lot of results I don’t need
What to do when a search term can mean two different things
How to search for two different things at once
2.
Smart
Searching happens when:
SELECT research questions and search tools.
(Explain to students that they should have one or more questions that get to the core of what they
want to find out in their search. They should also choose search engines and tools that are most
relevant to what they are looking for.)
EXTRACT keywords and terms.
(Students should understand that they can find effective keywords by highlighting the key terms
from their research questions.)
APPLY search strategies.
(Students should apply some of the search strategies they learned – for example, adding quotation
marks or a minus sign, or specifying what type of information they need.)
RUN your search.
(Students should run a search on the terms they have chosen and review the results. Remind
students
that they should check out multiple sources.)
CHART your search.
(Students can avoid repeating work they have already done by jotting down what they’ve searched
for
and where they’ve searched for it.)
Have student groups complete the Strategic Searching exercise to practice Smart Searching Techniques!
http://www.commonsensemedia.org/sites/default/files/6-8-unit1-strategicsearching.pdf - page 8 & 9 print off for students
Choose a large city in another state. Imagine that you work at a company located in that city. Each
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 5 of 6
Teach 3 Resource Set: Engage Students at All Learning Levels
year, your company has a yearly “employee appreciation” gathering. You are part of a group that is
planning the event, and your boss asked you to find a park in the local area where you can have a
picnic. The company has 50 employees. Money is tight, so you have to find a free or inexpensive
location.
Here is what you know you need:
 A public park (not private)
 A covered area in case it rains
 An area to play games and to do team-building exercises
 A location close to a catering business for easy delivery
 Restrooms
Your boss needs a recommendation in 15 minutes. Take 5 minutes to plan your search, using the
strategies you’ve already learned about, and 10 minutes to come up with a suggestion.
Go over students’ findings.
Resources
Internet connectivity
Smart Search Exercise
Lessons:
http://www.commonsensemedia.org/sites/default/files/6-8-unit1-strategicsearching.pdf
District of Columbia Public Schools | 2012-2013
Page 6 of 6