http://www.askjeeves.com

"You have to drill through mud and water to get oil, you have to sift through sand and silt to get gold, you have to chop and hack through stone to get diamonds... So why do so many people feel that the treasure of ideas should come to them with little or no effort"

Sydney J Harris

Still not sure what a search engine is? Click here to read a short explanation, before returning to this page.

Let us suppose we have a list of questions that need answers, for example:

1. Who is Nelson Mandela?
2. What does Marion Jones look like?
3. What is the effect of the moon on the tides in the sea?
4. How does light affect the growth of plants?
5. Who wrote, "The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed?"
6. Where is Egypt?

Lets look at the different ways in which the Internet can help us answer these questions.

AskJeeves (http://www.askjeeves.com ) is a search engine. It allows you to type in a question, using a normal English language sentence. If you type in a simple sentence, asking a question, AskJeeves will point you to several websites. AskJeeves will also ask you the same question in different ways, pointing you to alternative information sites. We highly recommend this tool, especially for young learners and novice searchers. There is also a junior version of AskJeeves which works in exactly the same way. The websites that appear are aimed at primary school children. The website address is http://www.ajkids.com .

Searching Using Ask Jeeves

Just so that you have a quick taste of what this search engine can do, let us try this simple search, using the question, "Who is Nelson Mandela?’  

Step 1: Log onto the Internet.

Step 2: Type in the address:  http://www.askjeeves.com  

Step 3: In the block indicated, type the question you want to ask

Step 4:      click on (See diagram below.)

Now let's do an example search, asking the question "Who is Nelson Mandela?"

AskJeeves will take a short while to return to you with a result. The time you spend waiting depends on the quality of your Internet connection at the time, but you should not have to wait for more than a minute or so. Here is an example of the screen that AskJeeves presents to you in answering the question:

Step 5: Below you will see an explanation about using Ask Jeeves, and what we see on the screen once it has given you a result to your question.

Step 6: Click on the sites to read the information in each site. (Remember this can only be done when you are connected to the Internet).

Note (referring to the lettering in the above image):

a   You click on to go to the information, but sometimes you will see hypertext links (underlined text) as well.

b   The is used to find other categories of information relating to the same question, but would normally take you away from your immediate topic of search (Nelson Mandela, in this case).

c   AskJeeves offers you the answers it has given to similar questions asked by other people before you. You could explore these if they look valuable to you.

d   AskJeeves also rates the popularity of the information source. For example is a 5-star rating. However, this does not necessarily mean that the information will have that value for your specific needs.

e   If there is a longer list of sites that it offers, you should click on the More link.

f    AskJeeves also gives you links to information from related searches.

g   Lastly, AskJeeves searches some other popular search engines and gives you a summary of the results it found there. You could explore these as well.

Unsuccessful result?

If your initial question was not answered to your satisfaction, try to rephrase the question. AskJeeves has more than likely been put off track by a word that you used in the question. This word may have more than one meaning. Try to replace this word with a different one, or ask the question in a slightly different way. For example, you may get different results if you ask "Who is Madiba?" and "Who is Nelson Mandela?".

Use the Web site evaluation form if you find useful sites. Click on the submit button below the form to share these websites with other educators.