I write. I analyze. I experiment. I do field studies and I try to understand what makes Google users tick.
Why do they sometimes query Google for [ first ], and then not click on anything?
Why do some Google users only ask one query, while others can go on and on?
What's different about their search experiences?
Why?
Me, having fun in the Bahamas with a few friends. Yes, he's about 3m long.
How do Google users measure success? What constitutes failure? How can the search engine know in order to make the next time you search that much better?
Most recently, I've been focusing on what skills searchers need to have in order to be effective searchers. Not surprisingly, just a few key skills can make your searching MUCH better.
This page is my home-page site; a collection of resources I've created--papers, essays, lessons, links to videos.
To read my blog about how to be a better searcher: SearchResearch
My blog: SearchResearch I started writing a blog about search and how people learn to research (and a few other topics that are related as well). Come read this if you're interested in improving your ability to search, if you want to learn about sensemaking or are curious about how to teach search or research skills in your classroom. I post roughly 3 to 4 times each week. Each Wednesday I post a Search Challenge that tests your ability to search. (And then I post the answers on Friday!)
Search Education: I run a small team at Google that is actively creating materials to teach people how to search. You can find LOTS of teaching resources at the Google Search Education Evangelism web site.
AGoogleADay.comIf you want to keep your search skills up, consider doing AGoogleADay.com each morning. It's a short, simple search challenge that will keep your skills sharp! (And you should be learning something new about the world every day as a side-effect.)
MOOC: AdvancedPowerSearchingWithGoogle.comA bunch of Googlers and I put together a MOOC on how to be a better searcher. The first two times we offered the MOOC we had good success (> 250K students have registered for the class since we first offered it in July, 2012). We last offered this class on January 23, 2013. Look for a return sometime in the winter of 2015.
If you are specifically interested in search classes for K-12 education, join: https://groups.google.com/d/forum/google-search-education-k-12On these lists we'll only send you a message when a new class is being offered. Note that users can't post to these groups (only we can!), so you won't be sent random messages.
Upcoming classes
"Basic Power Searching with Google" This course is now in "Evergreen" mode, meaning that you can take the class at any time. Alas, we no longer offer certificates. (It's a long story.)
We often hold classes at the Googleplex for teachers and librarians. Please drop me a note at drussell@google.com to let me know if you'd like me (or one of my staff) to come and teach at your school or library.
Click Here to sign up for the NEXT CLASS notification.
Tip Sheets (a list of summary cheat sheets for using Google)
All of the Google Advanced Operators All of the operators I know about, including search idioms (such as using the wildcard operator inside of double quotes).
October 2 - 6, 2017 "Field study methods practicum: Understanding How Designers Search" Cognitive Science, UCSD (COGS 90) -- a class in the pragmatics of ethnographic field studies
Select Recent Presentations (not all of them, thank heavens)
Course on "Social Computing." Originally offered February 23 - June 2, 2017. University of Zürich, Switzerland. 22 lectures. The complete syllabus (with links to videos, notes, slides).
"Search is not yet a solved problem" U. Washington DUB Seminar, Seattle, WA (Feb 1, 2017)
"Digging In With Google" class at Palo Alto (Gunn High School) EdTech Summit (aka GAFE) all about using Google Books to understand context. (July 11, 2015)
"Library of the Future" invited talk at the American Library Association (ALA), San Francisco, CA, (June 29, 2015)
"What does it mean to be literate in the Age of Google?" ACTEM Conference (Maine Education Conference), Augusta, ME (October 11, 2013) (Recording of the talk podcast by Bob Sprackle)
Short tutorial on logs analysis for HCI, HCI Consortium Meeting, Snow Mountain Ranch, CO (Feb 25, 2010) with Robin Jeffries, Sue Dumais and Jaime Teevan (PDF 3.1Mb) PPTX version (3.2Mb) PPT version (5.2Mb)
(Re)Searching with Google: Looking for the core of expertise (PDF 4.7 Mb) A talk given at UCSF library in the Lange Room. Topics: searcher behavior, definition of expert search behavior, the 6 dimensions of search expertise, a few examples of skills that expert searchers have. San Francisco, CA (Nov 7, 2008). The video for this talk can be seen here.
Search Strategies and Tactics: Internet search for teachers. (PPT 6.0 Mb) A 90 minute hands-on tutorial on search intended for teachers. Covers keyword choice, query refinement, other kinds of media, advanced operators (minus, site:, link:), credibility assessment. Presented at Google, Mountain View, CA (Sept 10, 2008)
Select Recent Papers(only the past couple of years, thank heavens)
Glassman, Elena L., and Daniel M. Russell.
"DocMatrix: self-teaching from multiple sources" Proceedings of the
79th ASIS&T Annual Meeting: Creating Knowledge, Enhancing Lives through
Information & Technology. American Society for Information Science, 2016.
(Copenhagen, Denmark)
Russell, Daniel M. "Simple is Good:
Observations of Visualization Use Amongst the Big Data Digerati."
Proceedings of the International Working Conference on Advanced Visual
Interfaces. ACM, 2016.
Russell, D. M., “What do you need to know to use a
search engine? Why we still need to teach research skills” AI Magazine 36(4) (Dec
1, 2015).
Russell, D. M., Teevan, J., Morris, M. R., Hearst,
M., & Chi, E. H. (2015, April). “Design for Searching & Finding” In
Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference Extended Abstracts on Human
Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 2457-2458). ACM.
Bederson, Benjamin B., Daniel M. Russell, and Scott
Klemmer. "Introduction to online learning at scale." ACM Transactions
on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI) 22.2 (2015): 5.
Kiczales, G., Russell, D. M., Woolf, B. (editors) Proceedings
of the Second (2015) ACM Conference on Learning @ Scale, Vancouver, British
Columbia. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2724660# (2015)
Russell, Daniel. "Mindtools: what does it mean
to be literate in the age of Google?." Journal of Computing Sciences in
Colleges 30.3 (2015): 5-6.
Russell, D. M.,
“Understanding user behavior at three scales: The AGoogleADay story” pp
199-214. Computer Games and Software
Engineering, by W. Scacchi, K. Cooper. Taylor & Francis. (2015)
Russell, D. M., “Research skills matter: How to teach them” chapter in: Moonshots in Education: Launching Blended Learning in the Classroom. by
E. Wojcicki, L. Izumi, A Chang (2014)
Pacific Research Institute, San Francisco, CA
Russell, D. M., E. Chi, chapter in: Ways of Knowing in Human-Computer
Interaction, Olson, J., Kellogg, W. (2014)
Chapter: “Looking Back: Retrospective Study Methods for HCI” p 373-394. (2014) Springer.
Dumais, Susan, Robin Jeffries, Daniel M. Russell,
Diane Tang, and Jaime Teevan. "Understanding user behavior through log
data and analysis." chapter in: Ways
of Knowing in Human-Computer Interaction, Olson, J., Kellogg, W. (2014) p.
349-372
Williams, J. J., Kizilcec, R. F., Russell, D. M.,
& Klemmer, S. R. (2014, April). "Learning innovation at scale." In CHI'14
Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 131-134). ACM.
Wilkowski, J., Russell, D. M., Deutsch, A. “Student
Skill and Goal Achievement in the Mapping with Google MOOC” ACM Learning at
Scale Conference, Atlanta, GA (2014)
Wilkowski, J., Russell, D. M., Deutsch, “A Self-evaluation
in Advanced Power Searching and Mapping with Google MOOCs” ACM Learning at
Scale Conference, Atlanta, GA (2014)
Russell, D. M. “Measuring learned skill behaviors post-MOOC”
In CHI'14 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp.
2233-2238). (2014, April).
1MM: A "1MM" is a "1 Minute Morceau" (or, in plural form, "morceaux"). These are very short videos that I've made to illustrate various points about search that keep coming up time and time again. I've tried to make them short, interesting, insightful, and occasionally funny. Let me know what you think. Here's a sample:
I often teach classes on how to use Google more effectively. (Google is easy to use now; but with a few tips, you can REALLY improve you ability to find things.)
These are the materials I use. If you're a teacher and want to re-use some of these materials, feel free! You might drop me a line to let me know what you're doing, but really, use with abandon!
Lesson plans for teaching search: Search education lesson plans. (16 different lessons on how to search--at beginning, intermediate and advanced levels of difficulty)
Advanced class: Advanced Search Techniques: Slides (PDF, 5.6Mb; has a good problem set; research literacy; overview of different Google content types; assessing web page credibility)
Teacher's class:Search Strategies and Tactics: Internet search for teachers.
(PPT 6.0 Mb; A 2 hour hands-on tutorial on search intended for
teachers. Covers keyword choice, query refinement, other kinds of
media, advanced operators (minus, site:, link:), credibility
assessment. All in 2 hours. Whew!)
Web Credibility: How do you learn to tell if something is credible or not on the web? Web Credibility (PDF 3.1Mb; a 2 hour hands-on class for teachers).
Search for Librarians: Top 12 Things You Need to Know (PDF, 3.4Mb; covers 12 short lessons on different methods for search. 1 hour class. Posted: October 14, 2009)
Advanced search: Advanced Internet Search, Santa Clara City Library (Santa Clara) (Oct 17, 2008)
When we misread (2016) You might think you're an expert reader. Think again. We all misread...
What causes someone to start searching? (2016) Curiosity might be the motivator, but once you get beyond simple curiosity, what gets you to actually start the searchprocess?
I have become the scribe for irregularly scheduled book club meetings. Here are notes from the last few times I've sat down with good friends in a nice restaurant and talked about books.
Interesting Papers I've written (or helped to write)
Olenewa, R., Gary M. Olson, Judith S. Olson, Daniel M. Russell "Now That We Can Write Simultaneously, How Do We Use That to Our Advantage?" Comm. of the ACM (August 2017, v 60, n 8) DOI:10.1145/2983527
Tunkelang, D., Capra, R., Golovchinsky, G., Kules, B., Russell, D. M., Smith, C., White, R., HCIR 2011: the Fifth International Workshop on Human-Computer Interaction and Information Retrieval, SIGIR Forum 45(2) (2012)
Russell, D. M. “Ubiquitous search for smart workspaces” Universal Access in the Information Society, vol 10 n. 4, p 11-20 (2011)
Russell, D. M. “The Streitz perspective: Computation is ubiquitous, yet must be designed for human use” Universal Access in the Information Society, vol 10, n. 4, p 4-10 (2011)
Editor, special issue of Universal Access in the Information Society (UAIS), vol 10, n 4 (November, 2011)
Druin, A., Gary Knell, Elliot Soloway, Daniel M. Russell, Elizabeth Mynatt, Yvonne Rogers, “The future of child-computer interaction” CHI EA 2011: Proceedings of the 2011 annual conference extended abstracts on human factors in computing systems, ACM, New York, NY, pp. 693-696
Moraveji, N., Russell, D. M., Mease, D. “Measuring improvement in user search performance resulting from optimal search tips” Proceedings of SIGIR 2011, Beijing, China (July, 2011)
Dumais, S., Jeffries, R., Russell, D. M., Tang, D., Teevan, J. “Large-scale logs analysis tutorial” SIGCHI full-day workshop, CHI 2011, Vancouver, B.C, Canada. (May, 2011)
Editor for special issue of Universal Access in the Information Society (a Springer journal) I put together this special issue as a Festschrift for Norbert Streitz. To be printed August 2012, while the papers are all available now on Open Online. See the complete table-of-contents for the special issue.
Co-editor Peter Pirolli, special issue on “Sensemaking” Human-Computer Interaction Journal, vol. 26, n. 1 & 2 (April, 2011)
Pirolli, P. Russell, D. M. “Introduction to this special issue on sensemaking” Human-Computer Interaction Journal, v 26, n 1 & 2, p 1 – 8 (April, 2011)
Ma, L., Mease, D., Russell, D. M. “A Four Group Cross-Over Design for Measuring Irreversible Treatments on Web Search Tasks” Proceedings of Hawai’i International Conference on Systems Sciences (HICSS) 2011, Kauai, HI.
Grimes, C., Tang, D., Russell, D. M.Query logs alone are not enough WWW 2007, Workshop on Query Logs Analysis: Social and Technological Challenges, Banff, Canada (May, 2007) PDF-288Kb
Lam, H., Russell, D. M., Tang, D.,Munzner, T., “Session Viewer: supporting visual exploratory analysis of web session logs” VAST-2007, Sacramento, CA. (October, 2007)
Orton, P. Z., Beymer, D., Russell, D. M., “Computer text line lengths affect reading and learning” Training and Development Journal (2007)
CHI 2008 Workshop on Sensemaking Workshop for the CHI conference 2008 on the topic of Sensemaking. Official CHI 2008 Sensemaking Workshop Page You can go there to see the papers we accepted. (We had a 50% acceptance rate!) (April 6, 2008)
