1. Today we are going to learn about how to do an inquiry based research as a class. While doing inquiry based research, we have to keep few things in our mindso that we can achieve the target without getting much deviated while checking out sites for research. Based on thiscriteria it will be easierto find the information we need.It is like skimming the needed information out of abundance of web-pages that might appear ifsearching casually . Keeping these important things in our mind, we can find what we are looking for and alsokeep our focus on the desired information. First of all, when searching, it is a good idea to useBooleanterms:

2. Use of Boolean Terms: - And -Or - Not Use of these terms will help eliminate unnecessary web pages that we mostly see and get confused with. It is like selecting and deselecting information, eg: polar bears and panda bears(both), polar bears or panda bears (either), polar bears not panda bears(only polar bears) , now once done we will look at: 3. Use of Quotation Marks - for words to appear in theorder 'you' specified Usage of QM will help us to find the exact same word we are looking for eg. polar bears this will further minus the presence of other animals in a web page-in other words you will see the pages that are more exclusive to polar bears: now let us move on to thewebsiteextensionsinformation: 4. Know your extensions: . org (stands for)organization .com/ .co company .sch school (used outside of US) .k12 most US school sites .edu US higher ed .gov US government (add country code for outside US) .ac higher ed outside of US usually used with country code, example, .ac.uk .net network .mil US military Now lets talk about theauthorityof a web page: 5.

Nowauthoritymeans to get to knowthe author of this page and other credentials of that person such as: * 'Is the page signed'? * 'Are the author's qualifications available'? * 'Does s/he have expertise in this subject'? * 'Is the author associated with an educational institution or other reputable organization'? * 'Does the publisher or publication have a reputation for reliability'? * 'Is contact information for the author or group available on the site'? Further more what we need to check is howcurrentthe information is?

6. Currency * 'Is the page dated'? * 'Can you find when was the last update'? * 'Are the links current and do they point to existing pages'? Once you know that web page is current one you need to check if the page contains enoughcoverage / informationon the topic, in this case about 'polar bears' which is our mutually selected search topic for now: 7. Coverage * 'Is the information even relevant to your topic'? * 'Do you think it is useful to you'? * 'Does this page have information that is not found elsewhere'? * 'How in-depth is the material'? Next we need to look for theobjectivityof the given information, we have to look if the material is free from anybias! 8. Objectivity * 'Does the information show a minimum of bias'? * 'Is the page a presentation of facts and not designed to sway opinion'? * 'Is the page free of advertisements or sponsored links'? http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/polar-bears/bear-essentials-polar-style http://www.seaworld.org/animal-info/info-books/polar-bear/index.htm As we will explore these pages further- based on the given/ or discussed criteria,we will find out why one is preferred over the other! Now lets talk about the accuracyof information given on web pages: 9. Accuracy * 'Is the information reliable and error-free'? * 'Can you find when was the last update'? * 'Is there an editor or someone who verifies/checks the information'? * 'Is the page free of spelling mistakes or other obvious problems'? Based on the information we will try to find the animal of our choice in one of thesearch enginesbut first we have to search for the engines that help us find what we are looking for: 10. List some major search engines: http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/information/5locate/adviceengine.htmlI find the first web page very helpful while searching for myself others are listed as follow, I also look for the Canadian content for Canadian Point of View for specific searches:http://www.noodletools.com/noodlequest http://www.tekmom.com/search/ http://dir.yahoo.com/regional/countries/canada/education/ http://ca.altavista.com/ 11. Things to remember : Find the work you need !- tryparaphrasing/use your words Copy and pasteisstealing- not acceptableCitation- is giving creditsto those who worked hardPlagiarism istheft /say noto it Your work isoriginalget itcopyright Copyrightall rights reserved Creative commonssome rights reserved 12. Before we do anything further, I want you to explore one more website just to be sure based on the criteria what we just did. Once divided in small groups and having discussed with your peers we will then discuss our findings as a class and move on to our next research : http://harrypotter.warnerbros.com/harrypotterandthedeathlyhallows/mainsite/index.html 13. My Sincere Thanks To : http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/pdf/evalmidd.pdf http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/evalelem.html http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/pdf/evalteacher.pdf http://www.tekmom.com/search/ http://www.lib.vt.edu/instruct/evaluate/ http://lib.nmsu.edu/instruction/evalcrit.html http://novemberlearning.com/resources/information-literacy-resources/ii-information-literacy-quiz-answer-key/ http://dir.yahoo.com/regional/countries/canada/education/ http://www.noodletools.com/noodlequest http://blog.archive.org/2010/02/03/black-history-month-and-famous-banjos/