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Helpful Information About Online Research
Need a little help with the crossword puzzle? Check out this page to learn more about how to search for information online, cite your sources, and much more. You'll find answers to the clues and will get a head start on your next research project.
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All About the Internet
Before the Internet, nearly all research for writing papers was conducted by going to a library and looking for information in books and magazines and on film-based formats called microfiche and microfilm.
As you can imagine, finding information with these sources could be difficult and could take a long time. But the Internet has made it much easier to do research. With a few strokes on a keyboard, you can quickly get lots of information.
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Choosing a Source
To begin a search for a research topic, you will need to decide which search engine you will use.
Popular search engines for kids include Yahoo! Kids, Ask Kids, and MSN Encarta. You will get different results from different search engines. You can use a metasearch engine, which searches several search engines at once. You may also choose to search a specific database, or collection of stored information. For example, the Library of Congress has a database of information on many topics related to the United States. |
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Selecting a Keyword
Once you have chosen where you will begin your search, you must select the keywords you will place in the search box. Try not to use pronouns (she, he, me) and articles (the, a, an) in your search. If you get too large a list of links, you may have to add more keywords or use the advanced search. If you don't get enough links, your search may be too narrow. In this case, use fewer keywords in your search. If you are searching for an exact phrase, put quotation marks around it. For instance, if you wanted to find information about the history of chocolate, you can search for "history of chocolate."
Choosing Helpful Links
After getting your search results, you will then need to choose the hyperlinks that seem to be most useful for your topic. Hyperlinks are often underlined, and you simply click on the text to go to your selected website.
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The website's URL, or Uniform Resource Locator, displays the address of the current website. All URLs begin with the letters "http".
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Once you visit the site, you can skim it to quickly view the text in search of key terms, phrases, or information you need for your research. If it seems to match, you can then scan it to quickly find the main ideas and see how well the site matches your research topic. To navigate back to your original results page, click on the back arrow button.
There are some things you should remember when searching. A website, or collection of web pages, can be made by almost anyone. This means that many people can share information. But it also means we need to be careful when we look for information on the Internet. Information posted on sites is not always correct. Some sites are more reliable or trustworthy than others.
While surfing the Internet, be certain to take precautions to protect your safety. Never give personal data without talking to an adult first.
Citing Your Sources
When you write your research paper, it is very important not to plagiarize. Plagiarism is when you use someone else's words as if they were written by you, either accidentally or on purpose. One way to avoid this is to cite every source in the bibliography section of your paper. Citing websites is different than citing books; for instance, many websites will not have a publication or copyright date.
More Information on Safe and Effective Internet Searches
Need Help Using the Crossword Puzzles Tool?
The Crossword Puzzles tool uses Flash Player 8 and above. You can download the latest version for free here.
- To enter a word, click on a box anywhere in the word.
- You can check your answers using the Check Puzzle button. Letters that are correct will be green; letters that are wrong will be red.
- Make the puzzle bigger and smaller by clicking on the + and – buttons on the screen.
- You can grab the puzzle and move it around on the screen. The Center button moves the puzzle back to the middle.
- You can turn the sound off and on using the sound icon.
- You cannot save your work in the puzzle. Make sure you click the Print button and print your puzzle before you exit.
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