Waaaaaaaaaay back in the day when I was a student at Nottingham Elementary, we had a team put together by the librarian, Barbara Jinkins, for an event called the Reference Bowl. Basically we would compete with teams at other schools to see who could look up answers to questions/problems the fastest.

The tools at our disposal were almanacs, atlases, dictionaries, and encyclopedias. There would be mad scrambles of children running through the library shelves to look up and cite information that would lead to the solutions and answers. This competition was to get children interested in research at an early age. At this point in time, you might think such an exercise is inefficient when you could just go Google it.

Today, Barbara is no longer just a librarian, her title has evolved into something more digital, Lead Library Media Specialist. The district now has a database of qualified and authenticated resources for students to use in research. This includes a repository of information funded by the state.

Did you know these existed? I hope so, because you are paying for them. The resource usage is tracked and re-evaluated every year.

Barbara notes that, 'This is what we encourage the students to use.' It's fine to Google, but if you are doing serious fact finding, documentation and authentication are your friends. Wikipedia won't necessarily cut it on the research you are putting together.

The Internet has been a huge boon of information, but without any filters how can anyone separate fact from fiction? Go Google a search on how caffeine is bad for you and you'll find just as many links to the opposing view. How is one to decide or know? I find that most people gravitate to certain trusted resources, be they web sites, blogs, or someone who keeps up with specific topics of interest. This is why social media is so huge, but that's another article.

The resources the district provides students is an awesome time saver. It narrows the field for the busy student trying to get some research done. If you have a child in the school district and they do not know how to access the online resources, contact your school's Library Media Specialist.

One of the links off the resource page is to the site for the Big 6, the research model the district uses. There's a lot more detail at the web site, but at the highest level it encompasses these 6 items:

1. task definition
2. information seeking strategies
3. locate and access information
4. use information for engagement through reading, hearing, touching, and viewing
5. synthesis in organizing and presenting the information
6. evaluate the effectiveness of the product and the efficiency of the process

However you go about it, perhaps you might want to take a little more care about what is being presented to you. Snopes can't cover everything. At the rate information proliferates on and across the intertubes, everyone publishes, but not everyone checks their sources. Seriously, I Googled it.

Need me to Google something for you? E-mail me at vietducnguyen@gmail.com.

Have a favorite fact finding engine or tool from the semantic web? Share please.