KidsClick!

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Created by a group of librarians, KidsClick! is a search engine for kids. All links are professionally chosen, evaluated, and cataloged by subject. You can use the alphabetical list of subject headings or browse the site by subject directories, narrowing by categories until you have an annotated list of relevant sites.

If you want to learn more about searching select Search Lessons to access Worlds of Web Searching. Links to more search tools, picture search tools and sound search tools are also listed at the top of the home page.

Back in the day, school librarians were always trying to teach the Dewey Decimal System. Library skills games, library treasure hunts and endless worksheets have been devoted to the topic. School librarians obviously knew something we didn’t, because we basically wonder to this day … What’s the point?! Why do we need to know the system behind the subject classification of books in the library?

The point is that searching is no fun. No one likes to search, everyone wants to find! In the days of Dewey and card catalogs, organizing materials by subject helped busy librarians to provide better access to materials. For many library users, good signs were all that was needed. Also, if you found one book about your topic, you could scan left and right to perhaps find another good book about the same topic. Labeling a section “641.5 — Cooking and Recipes” effectively provided access to the books covering the topic.

Now, with computerized catalogs, full-text indexes, and Internet search engines, we no longer need a subject classification system, right? Wrong! What we find is that students, and particularly younger students, cannot efficiently use the tools to find the information. They often search using broad terms and then page through endless hits looking for the most relevant sites. Sometimes they choose the wrong tools, click on banner ads, or just get lost in the volume of information. We can help; here are some great Web-based tools you can use to help students to be successful in their searching.

First, it is important to choose the right search tool. The same search will return very different results if you use different search engines, since every search engine uses different strategies to collect, sort, and index its links.

The best search for kids is KidsClick!. Like the LEARN NC Best of the Web, all links are professionally chosen, evaluated, and cataloged by subject. While both are safe for kids to search, KidsClick! has additional features that make it a great place for kids, specifically younger students.

There are many different ways to find good Web sites using the KidsClick! site. You can use the alphabetical list of subject headings; 600 headings are included. If you click on H to find hippopotamus, however, you will find nothing listed. If you use the search box, you can search keywords and find two sites with information about hippopotamuses, both classified under the subject heading “mammal.” The search returns a manageable list of evaluated sites, with an added feature: if a search returns no hits, the site suggests checking the dictionary to make sure your search term is spelled correctly. Finally, you can browse the site by subject directories, narrowing by categories until you have an annotated list of relevant sites.

KidsClick! hosts Worlds of Web Searching, an Internet searching tutorial written for upper elementary through middle school students. Using “next” will allow students to move in a linear fashion from simple alphabetical directories through numerical, keyword, and human-created directories. The tutorial is hyperlinked throughout, but the “modules” are named “World 7″ rather than a more useful, descriptive title like “Robots vs. Humans as database builders.” Search strategies are discussed, as is the fact that sometimes, depending upon what you’re looking for, the Internet isn’t the best place to look. Imagine how surprised a ten-year-old is to hear that!

Still wondering about that Dewey Decimal System? KidsClick! has a link on the front page to show you the site “through the eyes of a librarian.” This Dewey homepage uses numerical values instead of words to organize the sites. Ok, so only librarians think that’s cool. Librarians might also enjoy Dewey Browse, an Internet directory for K-12 organized by Dewey classifications.