Search engines can sometimes be a scary place. In his article, "Your Google Guide", Doug Johnson gives extremely helpful tips and explanations to help make Google searches more efficient for both educators and students. One fact that I found really interesting was that 80% of people using Google never proceed past the first page of results and have never used that advanced search feature. It's important that our students use the advanced search feature because it makes it produces more scholarly results then the regular one. Some tips that Mr. Johnson gave were to think of a question to find the answers. Instead of just typing San Diego Weather Patterns, it might be helpful to think of a question to narrow the search results. Another suggestion that the author gave was encourage and show students the importance of examining the key words given under the initial hit. This helps sort out the "good from the bad" and helps students save time.
Questions:
1. Why makes Google so much more popular than other search engines?
First, it's free. It's amazing the things you can find for free on this site. The other is that everyone has access to it. It seems to be more simple at first glance. Not everyone can access ERIC or EBSCO HOST which are a tad more in depth and might seem more complicated. I also think that because it's such a common word now, like "I'll Google it when I get home" people are more inclined to use it.
2. Is there much of a difference between this search engines and others?
I am no expert, but from the authors hints, they can be used on any other search engine. For example, there is the advance search, look at keywords, read through search tips, etc... on other data bases. I think that Google is a great start to receive quick public answers, but other search engines might give articles not always found on Google.
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