Pilot Project for addressing student tendencies to Google too much

How do you teach freshmen the differences between using Google or library resources? Freshmen in eight Speech 113 sections are participating in a pilot project which uses Blackboard to provide four instruction units on finding and evaluating information from different sources. The second module specifically focuses on the differences between search techniques and types of information that can be gathered via Google and via a library database such as Ebscohost Academic Search Premier.* Both searching avenues are discussed as to their strengths and weaknesses. The third and fourth modules provide the students with concrete criteria and techniques for evaluating sources – especially web sources. After working through the instruction units, the students take quizzes on Blackboard which are designed to reinforce the major concepts.

We are finding that the speech students who formerly on their own would just go to Google and search, now know that the library provides a depth of information via the library Web page. The module is assigned early in the semester so that the students know where to go for speech assignments and other assignments that require information gathering. The pilot project which started in the Spring 2003 semester with just two sections of Speech 113 has now expanded to eight sections. Professor Kathy Killoran and Professor Gretchen Gross developed the modules and are facilitating the usage of the Blackboard modules with the involved faculty and students. Should you have any questions, please contact either of us.
(*Ebscohost Academic Search Premier is one of the largest and most frequently used library electronic databases. It provides full-text access to articles from a variety of scholarly journals as well as magazines and newspapers.)

Gretchen Gross

Is it on the Web or delivered via the Web?

John Jay students grow more and more adept at searching general-purpose mass audience search engines like Google, but they do not yet conceptualize the difference between something that is "on the web" or simply delivered via the mechanism of the web. This is more than "difference without a distinction" because good assignments may founder on the students misconception of what research sources they are allowed to consult. When a professor says "Don t use the web!" he or she may be trying to introduce students to major professional databases in a field, databases like Criminal Justice Abstracts, NCJRS, or Sociological Abstracts. These databases have a long history and a formidable reputation. Yet they are now delivered over the web and accessed from the same computers and in much the same ways as any individual s site. Without ever having held a scholarly journal in one s hands, looked thoughtfully at the listing of an editorial board or at requirements for publication, or understood the concept of peer-review, students may well not understand that "on the web" is not the same as "via the web".

"Deep web" or "Invisible web" are terms that appear in the literature in an attempt to capture the difference between the two kinds of information. "Deep web" includes anything that is proprietary, paid-for, not readily accessed, and not depth-searchable by general search engines. Deep web, of course, includes databases like Lexis-Nexis, J-Stor, and The Historical New York Times that the library and the university pay for, and in general, most material that is highly structured and well indexed. Some webmasters, for a variety of reasons, block general search engines from finding their sites thus put themselves into the deep web. Until recently, most library catalogs and many worldwide digitized archives were part of the deep web.

By getting a bit more sophisticated in their web understanding and usage, and by learning how to use resources of the deep web, including the online tools key to each discipline, instead of just googling, John Jay students can display a contemporary mastery of the research process. Although the format looks a little different, the differences among the easiest answer, a correct answer, and the best answer still exist.

Janice Dunham