So How Do You Find the Good Stuff?

Summary

Students are taught about the difference between publishing a book and posting a web site, emphasizing the selectivity of the publishing process. The “1 – 2 – 3” approach to researching on the Internet is introduced. Students then get a chance to try out the first two steps.

Objectives

After this lesson, students will

Materials

   

Preparation

Activities

TimeActivity
5
min

Review

  • Review Lesson #1, availability of misinformation on Internet.
  • Discuss why students often end up with bad information: poor search strategies
15
min

Publication Process

  • Talk about use of librarian and teacher as primary resources. Books first!
  • Discuss the process of a book making it into a library as compared to a website making it out on the Internet
    1. Book: Author, Publisher, Editor, Bookstores, Reviewer, Librarian
    2. At each level, poorly prepared materials are weeded out.
    3. Internet: Author, Internet
    4. No selectivity—anyone can publish
20
min

Easy as 1 – 2 – 3

15
min

Now You Try It!

  • Students reconvene into pairs from Lesson 1
  • Each pair finds one basic fact about their explorer (e.g. birthdate) in three sources: a book, a subscription database, and a subject directory.
  • Students should record the source (basic bibliographic information) and the fact on the Now You Try It! worksheet.
  • Students compare the information they found with the fact at AllAboutExplorers.com and explain how they know that AAE is incorrect.
  • Save the fact worksheets for lessons 3 and 4.
5
min

Summary & Preview of future lessons

  • Review and emphasize the importance of pre-screening and selecting information in these sources
  • Next lesson will focus on effective use of search engines (step 3).