Search Engines & Web Navigation
Search engines and proper Web navigation allow teachers and students to find better information. There are many search engines available such as: Google, Bing, Yahoo, Ask.com, and AOL. While these are most popular in the United States, some may not produce appropriate information for teachers and students to view for classroom use. Search Engine Watch is a site that offers information on all available search engines, most popular searches, and recent search-related news. This site offers various types of sites such as filtered ones for kids and social networking search engines. This can be helpful for teachers in the classroom to teach digital citizenship and netiquette. (Roblyer & Doering. 2016. p. 183).
Website Evaluation
In this video a teacher is explaining to her students how to evaluate sources on the internet as her Technology Committee Project. The teacher has the students actively participate in learning and discovering how to evaluate sources. The project was successful because the students understood what it meant to evaluate something and then were able to apply that to evaluating sources on the internet through a series of steps and guidelines.
Favorite Professional Websites
One website that would be helpful as a teaching professional is Edmodo. Edmodo is a social network website that has been modified and refined to be appropriate for classroom use. With Edmodo, students and teachers can connect with each other by sharing ideas, problems, and helpful tips. It also allows a person to add pictures, links, and videos to a post. According to Robyler (2016. p. 198). Edmodo meets the Website Evaluation Criteria Checklist because it is easy to navigate and and the content is organized.
Another website that would be helpful as a teaching professional is Scholastic. Scholastic is a website that offers educational resources and materials for teachers, students, parents, administrators, and librarians. Due to this website's current, up-to-date content and excellent visual design, it meets the Website Evaluation Criteria Checklist according to Robyler (2016. p. 198).
Online Safety and Security
According to Robyler (2016. p. 174-175), although the online world has many benefits, it also has several issues such as: society-wide debates, problems, and controversies. The main umbrella issue is safety and privacy for students. Under that umbrella term fall categories like online predators, sales pitches aimed at children, privacy issues, and cyber bullying. Online predators are an issue I believe to be most prominent is today's society. Students should not believe everything they read or hear because a person online who gives their name and age could possibly be lying. It is important students know to never share/provide their complete names, addresses, or telephone numbers to anyone over the internet. They should also know to report to their teacher any person who asks them to share/provide these things.
