Task 2: Go To A Specific Web Site:
For some distance learning course assignments, it necessary to go to a specific web address.
1) Type http://nces.ed.gov in the address text box. The web site is the National Center for Education Statistics.
2) Bookmark this web site for a future assignment.
Task 3: Using a Search Engine:
It is often necessary to research a topic. When searching for information on the web, it is better to be more specific regarding a subject area, rather than selecting a general topic.
An example would be to search on the topic of sport cars (more specific), rather than typing cars (general topic.) The search result for cars may include websites regarding sport cars, but if sport cars would be entered in the search textbox, then the query results would be more specific to sport car. If the search topic is not specific, the number of hits from the search results may be overwhelming.
Different search tools provide different results because the search methods are different. Search engine examples that search and provide a comprehensive hits list include: www.yahoo.com, www.lycos.com, www.google.com, or www.altavista.com.
1) Open the www.yahoo.com search engine.
2) In the search text box, type in the words first college year.
Because this information will be used in a future activity (Assignment 3 Basic Communication Skills Task 3 ), make a note of how many search entry results there were because this information will be used in an activity in the next module.
3) To initiate the search, depress the Enter key on the keyboard or click the Search key on the webpage.
A search engine can also be used to search for a specific website if the URL is forgotten. To do this, open a search engine and type in the name of organization, company or government agency. Then click the search button or depress the ENTER key. From the hits of the search results, select the hit entry for the organization, company, or government agency.
1) Open the www.google.com search engine. In this activity, the search will be to locate the National Center for Education Statistics.
2) In the search text box, type the words National Center for Education Statistics.
3) Depress the ENTER key or click the Google Search button. From the hits, select the hyperlink that will open the homepage of the National Center for Education Statistics.
Note that this is the same website that was accessed in Assignment 2, but a different tool was utilized to access it.
Task 4: Narrowing a Search Results
1) Continue to use the Yahoo search engine.
2) To narrow the search results, type the same phrase but enclose the phrase in quotes “first college years”.
When using some search engines, the entry results will be significantly less than the number in the first search. In addition to using Boolean operators to increase or narrow a search, quotation marks placed around specific phrases also narrows the search. The search engine will only search for the terms that are within the quotes.
Make a note of the entry results of the second search entry results because this information will be used in an activity in (Assignment 3 Basic Communication Skills Task 3 ).
Task 5: Extend Research Skills
In addition to searching for specific topics, course lessons may require research topics. Using the Boolean operator AND, search for a journal article that includes the topics asynchronous learning and trends for asynchronous learning.
In this activity, a search engine that uses metasearch technology will be used. This search engine searches multiple search engines at once. The metasearch engine, www.dogpile.com, delivers a more comprehensive search result every time a search is initiated.
1) Open the www.dogpile.com search engine.
2) In the search text box, type in the words Asynchronous Learning AND trends.
3) To initiate the search, depress the Enter key on the keyboard or click the Go Fetch key on the webpage.
4) Scroll down through the hits, and locate a journal article.
5) Open a word processing program and create a new document, save the file as a rich text file and save it as Asynchronous Learning.
6) In the new document, write a three line paragraph that includes a description of asynchronous learning and/or any new trends.
7) In a second paragraph, identify the name of the article, the author and the URL.
Remember where the document is saved, because it will be used in (Assignment 3 Basic Communication Skills Task 5).
Updated 1-11-07
