Internet Research

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Using the Internet for research in school

Google
Google is the first site kids usually go to when faced with a question they don't know the answer to. Good information can be found there, but it takes some skill to be able to find it efficiently.

These PDF files include nice information on Google's search tools:
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is more of a overview and collection of resources than a resource itself. Its strength is in the large number of people accessing and editing information. Misinformation is usually corrected very quickly. Updates to existing articles are also posted very quickly.

What is Wikipedia? (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia)
Wikipedia is a multilingual, web-based, free-content encyclopedia project based on an openly-editable model. The name "Wikipedia" is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a technology for creating collaborative websites, from the Hawaiian word wiki, meaning "quick") and encyclopedia. Wikipedia's articles provide links to guide the user to related pages with additional information.

Wikipedia is written collaboratively by an international group of volunteers. Anyone with internet access can write and make changes to Wikipedia articles. There are no requirements to provide one's real name when contributing; rather, each writer's privacy is protected unless they choose to reveal their identity themselves. Since its creation in 2001, Wikipedia has grown rapidly into one of the largest reference web sites, attracting around 65 million visitors
monthly as of 2009. There are more than 85,000 active contributors working on more than 14,000,000 articles in more than 260 languages. As of today, there are 3,173,459 articles in English. Every day, hundreds of thousands of visitors from around the world collectively make tens of thousands of edits and create thousands of new articles to augment the knowledge held by the Wikipedia encyclopedia.

Visitors do not need specialized qualifications to contribute. Wikipedia's intent is to have articles that cover existing knowledge, not create new knowledge (original research). This means that people of all ages and cultural and social backgrounds can write Wikipedia articles. Most of the articles can be edited by anyone with access to the Internet, simply by clicking the edit this page link. Anyone is welcome to add information, cross-references, or citations, as long as they do so within Wikipedia's editing policies and to an appropriate standard. Substandard or disputed information is subject to removal. Users need not worry about accidentally damaging Wikipedia when adding or improving information, as other editors are always around to advise or correct obvious errors, and Wikipedia's software is carefully designed to allow easy reversal of editorial mistakes.

Because Wikipedia is an ongoing work to which, in principle, anybody can contribute, it differs from a paper-based reference source in important ways. In particular, older articles tend to be more comprehensive and balanced, while newer articles more frequently contain significant misinformation, unencyclopedic content, or vandalism. Users need to be aware of this to obtain valid information and avoid misinformation that has been recently added and not yet removed (see Researching with Wikipedia for more details). However, unlike a paper reference source, Wikipedia is continually updated, with the creation or updating of articles on historic events within hours, minutes, or even seconds, rather than months or years for
printed encyclopedias.

We and our students need to know how to get the most out of Wikipedia. It should not be considered a main source of research; it is merely a jumping-off point. Here are some tips for using Wikipedia for research.
  1. Use Wikipedia to gather background information in order to put your topic in context.
  2. Reference the links at the bottom of the Wikipedia entry. Each entry has a few links to outside sources. Also, the footnoted references usually like to the original source. These linked sources are good places to explore the topic further.
  3. Don’t cite Wikipedia itself in your research, use it to lead you to more scholarly sources instead. The links on each page are good sources to cite. Think of Wikipedia not so much as an encyclopedia, but as a place to direct your research. I like to think of it as a collection of links that happens to have a detailed summary on each topic.
For students’ research, sometimes the Wikipedia Selection for Schools is more appropriate. This is not an editable source, so it is not subject to the potential misinformation or inappropriate content that the main Wikipedia is. It is not nearly as comprehensive as all of Wikipedia, but it is a good resource for many of our students’ needs.
MARVEL!
All Maine residents have access to Maine’s Virtual Library. Students have access in school, and all other residents can log in from home after they create an account.

MARVEL! provides every resident of Maine with access to a collection of full text articles and abstracts from magazines, newspapers, journals and reference books that are credible, reputable resources. MARVEL! also provides students, business people, public library patrons, and higher education students and educators the ability to search a number of resources at one time for information. The value of the resources provided in these databases would be over $700,000 per library!

One example of cost savings is as follows:

  • Maine has 214 schools (public and private) that contain grades 9-12. If one of these schools were to purchase just the EBSCO resources contained in MARVEL!, it would cost that school approximately $20,000.
  • If all 214 Maine schools purchased just the EBSCO materials on their own, the total cost would be $4,280,000.
Funding comes from the Maine State Legislature and the joint efforts of Maine State Library, University of Maine, Colby, Bates, Bowdoin Colleges, the Public Utilities Commission, and MTEAF (Maine Telecommunications Educational Access Fund), commonly known as state E-rate. This collaboration makes statewide licensing of MARVEL! resources extremely cost effective and provides these resources for every school, library and resident of Maine.

There are is a huge collection of quality resources in MARVEL! This is an excellent place to do research on just about any topic.
Kid-friendly search engines
Sometimes Google is too overwhelming, though, and then these other search engines may be helpful:
Baloney Detection Kit
"It seems to me what is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas.... If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you.... On the other hand, if you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of skeptical sense in you, then you cannot distinguish the useful ideas from the worthless ones" Carl Sagan, 1987

The Baloney Detection Kit, developed by Carl Sagan, is a series of questions to ask when you are faced with a questionable source of information. These questions can help you determine if the information is reliable or not. This video is a nice overview of the idea.

When using it with kids, I like to summarize the questions like this:
  • Did somebody else study this and say it’s true?
  • Do the authors consider other points of view?
  • Do the authors recognize that they are not authorities? 
  • Do the authors consider other possible explanations?
  • Did the authors test and measure their theory?
  • Does every part of the theory make sense?
  • Is the theory too complicated?
  • Is it possible to prove the theory false?
Citing sources
At the middle school level, students are just learning the importance of giving credit to their sources. One handy tool for helping them create their citations is EasyBib. By the end of 8th grade, students should be able to generate a proper citation and be in the habit of giving appropriate credit to the sources.

http://sites.google.com/site/brooklininternetresearch

Amy Bebell - Technology Coordinator

amy.bebell@msln.net
Brooklin School