Lesson 4 Integrating Technology “Search Challenge Methods”
LESSON 4
“Search Challenge” Method
Time: 15-20 minutes as follows:
- 5-8 minutes working on a Search Challenge
- 5-8 m consulting the Quick Reference Guide
- 4-5 minutes applying the methods to investigate genochoice.com
Materials:
- http://searchwhys.com/CTD12/QR/freshness-1.html
- http://www.genochoice.com/
- computers, one with a projector
- Red Flag Chart (see Lesson One)
Introduction
The site being investigated is Genochoice.com
The Search Method being applied is “determing freshness” (when the site was created or last updated).
Have students try the following Search Challenge. If they get stuck (no progress after 8 minutes) have then refer to the Freshness Guide.
Challenge: Is the material on Genochoice.com fresh or stale? When was it last updated? Choose three pages on the site. Use appropriate search technique to find the date each page was last updated (this may not be the same at the copyright date).
Without previous instruction, students will likely not know how to find the date. Be sure they use the Guide rather than get frustrated.
Quick Reference Guide
This resource was created to help students enrolled in 21cif online courses that teach Research Skills. It’s a free resource that provides methods to locate and interpret missing dates for articles and Web pages (plus a lot more).
Application
Once students understand several techniques, have them research genochoice.com to find missing dates.
Add or move Red Flags on the Red Flag Chart as a result of investigation (see Lesson One for an explanation).
Genochoice is rather tricky in this regard, as are many other sites. Archive.org may be the best method to compare how long pages have remained the same. Genochoice has no files that can be downloaded to check freshness and the javascript on each page records the opening of the page as the last update.