Exploring the Internet:
How Search Engines Work

Abstract

Students will do so by performing a scavenger hunt designed by Dr. Garrett Love, at Shodor Education Foundation, to find various facts on the Internet.

This lesson utilizes the Boolean logic which is the use of Venn diagrams to represent the information space on the web. Students will use various search engines to perform different tasks.

Objectives

Upon completion of this lesson, students will:

• Have practice in using search engines. Students will possess knowledge that will allow them to use search engines to accurately find information of interest.

• Formulate questions that can be addressed with data
• Collect, organize, and display relevant data to answer the questions

Student Prerequisites

• Students must be able to:
  • perform basic mouse manipulations such as point, click and drag
  • use a browser such as Netscape for experimenting with the activities

Teacher Preparation

Students will need:

• Access to a browser
• Pencil and Paper
• A copy of the Scavenger Hunt

Lesson Outline

In this lesson, students will learn to use Boolean logic (a system of using the operators +,/,- to represent and, or, not), while searching the Internet. Venn diagrams are used to explain why searches are conducted the way they are. The students are given a scavenger hunt of 39 questions, which asks them to find information ranging from a list of television stations in Phoenix, Arizona to the director of Development Operations at the University of Notre Dame. It highly possible that the answers which the students find may vary on certain questions (for example, the death rate of the United States). The students also learn about good web sources: they are consistent and professional for the most part. Students should be able to determine whether or not a source is "good" and explain why. Show the students some examples of both good and bad web pages. The students will also learn how some types of web sites may be more accurate and reliable than others.

Alternate Outlines

This lesson can be rearranged in several ways:

• The activity may be shortened to keep the students' attention.
• Assign a couple of groups to each page or set of questions on the scavenger hunt. Have them explain their answers.