Becoming Web-Literate

Activity 1: Comparing Indexes and Search Engines

  • Decide on a topic to search for and try to find information using a directory and again from a search engine. Use the chart below to compare the experience.
  • Directories: Yahoo! ...... LookSmart ...... Open Directory
  • Search Engines: Google ...... AltaVista ...... Fast

Search target:

Index used:

Results:

Search Engine used:

Results:

Which worked better? Why?

Search target:

Index used:

Results:

Search Engine used:

Results:

Which worked better? Why?

Search target:

Index used:

Results:

Search Engine used:

Results:

Which worked better? Why?

 

 

Activity 2: Honing the Search

  • You've seen a couple of techniques for improving your results using a search engine. Try them with your own search and record the results here.
Search target in general terms:
Search engine used:
Attempt
Search terms used
Hits returned and relevance
1
    
2
    
3
    
4
    
5
    

Search target in general terms:
Search engine used:
Attempt
Search terms used
Hits returned
1
    
2
    
3
    
4
    
5
    

Search target in general terms:
Search engine used:
Attempt
Search terms used
Hits returned
1
    
2
    
3
    
4
    
5
    

Activity 3: Evaluating web resources

Here's a mixed bag of web sites. Take a look at several and answer the two questions for each one.

Site visited

Does this page meet the five criteria to make it suitable as a resource?

 

What clues on the page did you use to make your determination?
 

 

 

 

Site visited

Does this page meet the five criteria to make it suitable as a resource?

 

What clues on the page did you use to make your determination?
 

 

 

 

Site visited

Does this page meet the five criteria to make it suitable as a resource?

 

What clues on the page did you use to make your determination?
 

 

 

Send comments to Pat Sine at sine@udel.edu. -->
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