Ask a Librarian Delaware

Additional Web Resources/Online Search Guidelines

Protecting patron privacy and confidentiality are of upmost importance and a priority for libraries!

Please see these ALA Guidelines for Private Online Searching & Browsing

Search Engines

Google

• Google Advanced Search offers a way to limit your search by reading level and to certain types of sites, such as .gov or .edu
• Here is Google’s Advanced Image Search
• Here is Google Scholar – includes a patent search
• Google Books – includes some magazines
• Advanced search techniques for Google users.

DuckDuckGo

• Privacy Learn about the filter bubble and use your search engine’s ‘incognito’ setting

Wayback Machine

• Part of the Internet Archive, a non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, software, music, websites, and more. – Wayback Machine is a collection of archived websites/webpages

Web Evaluation Guidelines

Evaluate your sources – Guidelines/Resources

• ACT UP Method created by Dawn Stahura at Simmons University Library (2018)
• COR – Civic Online Reasoning (stanford.edu)
• How to evaluate websites using the CRAAP test.
• Science Buddies offers a basic web evaluation comparison chart for students.
• SIFT Method – Stop, Investigate the source, Find better coverage, Trace claims, quotes, & media to the original context
  • Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers – Simple Book Publishing (pressbooks.pub)
• Delaware Libraries LibGuide on Fake News

Examples:

• Compare – Epa.gov vs. Epafacts.com
• Search for “dinosaur” on Wikipedia.org vs. Conservapedia (Look at the “Talk” page).
• Vampire Authors:  Sometimes people take credit for another person’s work.  See Google Books and Amazon for “Lambert M. Surhone” = ‘vampire author’.  “Lambert” has put his name on many titles, taking authorship credit.

Spoof sites:

• “Pacific NW tree octopus” See: https://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/
• “The Pope Comes to America” – CNN news video showing the Pope pulling a tablecloth out from under candlesticks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYjeWGH8Z1c
• Clone Zone: “Tweak the world’s most popular websites”  Sites like these make it easy to trick searchers into believing they are accessing a reputable source when it’s just a clone of a site.  For example, the New York Times can be cloned and edited to look like it contains reliable news from this source when in reality it’s made-up information.

Searching and Recommended Resources found outside Delaware

• The Library of Congress has compiled a helpful list of reference resources available on the web.
  • Library of Congress Research Guide: City Directories
• TED Talks offer educational and interesting presentations from cutting edge scientists, educators, authors, innovators, etc.
• PEW Reports give current research, much about technology/Internet/mobile devices and libraries.
• US Census
• POTUS – All about every US President
• Find a Grave (commonly used for genealogy research)
• Juvenile Series & Sequels database from Mid-Continent Public Library

Professional Resources from PLA (Public Libary Association division of American Library Association)

• Virtual Reference
• Technology Reference
• Reference Training Tools
• Super Searchers Toolkit

To assist you with question-answering processes on LibAnswers:

Tutorials & How To’s Page

Technology troubleshooting and issues:

Having trouble logging in?  Many times, clearing your browser’s cache (search history) will make things work.  This is also great to know for your patrons.

• How to Clear Your Browser’s Cache from ComputerHope
• Ask a Librarian Delaware’s Help page