Saving Internet Searches and Resources

Transcription

1 Saving Internet Searches and Resources You and your students will find many resources on the Internet. Sometimes there is a graphic that is perfect for a presentation or project. Or, there may be some text that is needed for research. It is important to know how to save text and graphics to your own computer to use in future projects, etc. Additionally, wouldn t it be great to be able to save a search you have done? Once you take the time to develop a proper search strategy and end up with a perfect list of links, you may want to save it to use in the future. Fortunately, there are ways to save your searches using a special tool in Google. Be sure to discuss how to cite Internet sources with your students. They should understand that they need to cite these sources just as they would cite any other traditional source. There are several methods for citing sources, all of which are presented in this course. Saving Graphics As students look for and find graphics to use in presentations, they will want to save them. The easiest way to handle this from a classroom management perspective is to create an individual folder for each student on your computer hard drive or the school network. Students can be instructed to save all of their graphics into their folders. Then, when it comes time to put their presentations or papers together, all their graphics are in one place. Once you or your students find graphics, follow these basic instructions to save using Internet Explorer or Google Chrome. Right-click on the graphic you want to save. Select Save Image/Picture As. Give the graphic a file name that will make it easily identifiable when it comes time to place it into a presentation or paper. Select a location to save to such as each student s electronic folder as mentioned above. Click Save.

2 Saving Text Saving text can be precarious. You must caution students about this because it is important to encourage them to cite their sources, paraphrase, and only use direct quotes when absolutely necessary. So, saving text should be used only in specific circumstances. One good use for saving text is if you wish to have the ability to read something offline. If computer access is an issue, students can save the text of articles, etc. and then read it at another time completely offline. Or, they can save all their research into their own electronic folders and then read and sift through all the data at one time and offline. To save text, use the following instructions.. Highlight the text you want to save. Go to the File menu and select Copy. Give the file a name. Encourage students to be very descriptive with the name so it is easy to know what the file is later when they try to retrieve the information. Click Save. Encourage students to keep all their saved text in their electronic folders. Using Bookmarks/Favorites Have you ever found a great website and written the site address down so you could visit it again and again? Have you ever lost the piece of paper that had the address on it? Or, have you ever typed the address incorrectly and had to retype the whole thing? Would you like to find an easier way? You can "bookmark" your favorite sites on the Internet so that they will be easier to return to time and time again. Follow the basic steps below to save bookmarks depending on the browser you use. Internet Explorer Click on the Favorites folder in the toolbar. It is the star on the top right side of the screen. The list of favorites will be displayed in the left hand frame of the screen. Click Add to Favorites.

3 The name of the website page will automatically be the name of the favorite. However, you can change the name by typing in something that is easier for you to recognize. You can also select a folder to save the favorite into. When you are finished, click Add. Google Chrome Click on the Star icon on the top right-hand corner.

4 You can name the bookmark anything you like. Choose a folder to save the link into or simply save it as a bookmark. When you are finished, click Done. Firefox Safari Click the Star icon in the Location Bar. Firefox will add it to your bookmarks automatically. When you find a site you like, create a new bookmark by clicking and dragging the site s icon into the Bookmarks Bar. Try It! Go to three of your favorite websites and create a bookmark. Saving an Internet Search Think of the time you can save with the ability to save a search you have done. This can also be very useful to students with limited time on the computer. They can use one session to conduct their searches and another session to start looking deeply at the results. Google offers the option to save your search. You do not need Google Chrome installed to do this. All you need is a Google account and the Google toolbar installed on your current browser. To download the Google toolbar for Internet Explorer, visit the following link:

5 Once you have the Google toolbar, simply conduct your search. Google will store your searches automatically. If you wish to view the saved searches, you will need a Google Account. To get started, click on the Search icon and choose Web History. At this point, you will need to establish your Google account. You might as well take care of this now since you will need a Google account for many of the goodies that will be shared in the Google section of this course. Once you have an account you can click Enable Web History or Limit Web History to Searches. You will now have the ability to click on a calendar and select any day and review your web search from that day. You even have the ability to organize and categorize your searches so you can quickly and easily find them in the future. If you don t want to install the Google toolbar, you can still see your history. In Google, click the three navigation dots and choose History. In Internet Explorer, click the Star icon and then click the History tab.