What Keywords Do I Still Need?
Objectives - ISTE NETS for Students #3: Research and Information Fluency
"locate information from a variety of sources and media"
Materials
Directions
This hands-on activity challenges students to find better and additional keywords in a snippet. It may be helpful in advance to explain what a snippet it: the abstract or summary of a Web page that Google and other search engines return after a query. Explain that snippets are often a good place to look for better keywords, as demonstrated by the online activity.
The directions for the activity are simple: students are to find clues about better keywords by reading a snippet and clicking on words they think will improve the Wizard's query. Each word in the snippet is clickable and provides immediate feedback and a score.
It is possible to earn 5 points for better words found in this snippet (one word is worth 3 points because it is the most powerful). Some words are hard to spot: ENCYCLOPEDIA is not directly related to the question but it is a good word to include to find more information about the topic. HUNDRED is also tricky but makes the point that HUNDRED is a more specific word than MANY. By the way, this game is based on actual searching and HUNDRED does improve the results.
If a student earns the 5 points and has fewer than 5 misses, the BISON takes off running.
You may want to find snippets related to a topic in your class and have students read it to find additional keywords.
