Reflections from Week 3

I found the MAPping activity to be very interesting. At school I normally use Google to search and at home I use Yahoo. I now know that I really need to pay attention to what comes up at hits. If I am looking for any type of research information I usually go through the EBSCO databases. I picked the California's Velcro Crop Shortage to do the MAPping activity with because the title sounded ridiculous to me. It made me wonder if there was a different type of Velcro out there than what you use to make stuff stick together. The activity showed that this was definitely a fake website. This activity made me realize that I need to look at the web addresses and decipher them when I search for a specific topic. I usually try to use web sites that I am familiar with when I am using the web, especially if it is a site I am using to show my students something. I think it is very important for students to learn how to decipher web addresses. Our filter at school blocks out a lot of sites that are inappropriate but in most cases the students are using the Internet at home unsupervised. They have no way of knowing if they are getting accurate information if they are not taught how to decide if it is a trustworthy site.

I really like using Delicious. I had used it before to help me keep up with my bookmarks between home and school but I never realized that you could network with other people and see their bookmarks. I can really see this as an advantage. I like the idea that someone else can find a really cool site and bookmark it and then it is there for everyone in the network to use.