Internet topic searching matched with search engines to provide Relevant information to it/is students – a South African approach [0067] (original) (raw)
Related papers
Proceedings of the Bitworld99. 30 June-2 July. Cape Town, South Africa., 1999
Some early research has proven that students show a higher level of participation in a class if they are involved in their own evaluation. It has also been proven that they are keen to use the internet to find information relating to their studies. A pilot study was used to build a measuring instrument to be used to determine student’s ability to search for information. A country-wide research tour followed. The instrument was then used to measure various parameters involving the degree of success experienced by students during internet searching. It was found that only 38% of the subjects found the information they were looking for within 30 minutes in a controlled environment. There was also strong evidence that historically disadvantaged students had a lower searching success rate than others. Early versions of a model to assist students in the searching process have shown promise of success.
In this thesis, the author attempted to develop a method to help Information Technology/Systems learners find relevant information on the Internet. The literature indicated that it is essential that learners should be able to retrieve relevant information from electronic sources. However, it was also stated repeatedly that searching on the Internet using standard search engines is not an easy task. It was also noted that a move was taking place away from traditional teaching methods to those with more learner involvement, making use of new computer and communication technologies. Initial experiments were done with IT/IS learners to determine how and where they search on the Internet, and what degree of success they had. The most important data gathered from these experiments was the lack of search strategy displayed by learners; the search engines chosen by them; and their success rate. Only 32.2% of all learners in this study managed to find one piece of relevant information in 30 minutes without any assistance. The data was used to design and later improve a tool to guide them in their searching endeavours. This tool, called “Finder Of Information On The Internet” (FOIOTI, at http://www.mwe.co.za), was then extensively tested by measuring searching success, with and without using it. The data was gathered by examining and summarizing the forms completed by the learners during the searching experiments. During this study the author found that most learners had little or no training on Internet usage; often worked on the Internet; could not specify their search properly; used very few of the operators offered by search engines; and had a low success rate in finding relevant data. The two final phases of experiments proved that FOIOTI, as a searching tool, was successful. During these two phases, 71.0% of the participants claimed that they found the specified information when using FOIOTI within 30 minutes. A total of 1109 learners from three continents and 20 institutions took part in the study, spread over 46 sessions. Every session was administered personally by the author. This research project has contributed to the existing body of knowledge on Information Retrieval and education by having developed a tool that enhances learner involvement in the learning process. It enables educators to explore easier alternatives of locating educational resources by drawing on the experience of other website authors in their field. It also entices the average learner to re-skill him/herself on the use of an exciting and promising new technology: Information Retrieval through the Internet.
Master's Dissertation, 2012
The purpose of this mixed methods study was to investigate the Web search strategies used to retrieve information from the Web by postgraduate students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg campus in order to address the weaknesses of undergraduate students with regard to their Web searching strategies. The study attempted to determine the Web search tactics used by postgraduate students, the Web search strategies (i.e. combinations of tactics) they used, how they determined whether their searches were successful and the search tool they preferred. In addition, the study attempted to contribute toward building a set of best practices when searching the Web. The sample population consisted of 331 postgraduate students, yielding a response rate of 95%. The study involved a two-phased approach adopting a survey in Phase 1 and interviews in the Phase 2. Proportionate stratified random sampling was used and the population was divided into five mutually exclusive groups (i.e., postgraduate diploma, postgraduate certificate, Honours, Master’s and PhD). A pre-test was conducted with ten postgraduate students from the Pietermaritzburg campus. The study revealed that the majority of postgraduate students have been searching the Web for six years or longer and that most postgraduate students searched the Web for information from five to less than ten hours a week. Most respondents gained their knowledge on Web searching through experience and only a quarter of the respondents have been given formal training on Web searching. The Web searching strategies explored contribute to the best practices with regard to Web search strategies, as interviewees were selected based on the highest number of search tactics used and they have several years of searching experience. The study was also able to identify the most preferred Web search tool. It is envisaged that undergraduate students can potentially follow these search strategies to improve their information retrieval. This finding could also be beneficial to librarians in developing training modules that assist undergraduate students to use these Web search tools more efficiently. The final outcome of the study was an adaptation Bates’ (1979) model of Information Search Tactics to suit information searching on the Web.
Uncovering Web search strategies in South African higher education
SA Journal of Information Management
Background: In spite of the enormous amount of information available on the Web and the fact that search engines are continuously evolving to enhance the search experience, students are nevertheless faced with the difficulty of effectively retrieving information. It is, therefore, imperative for the interaction between students and search tools to be understood and search strategies to be identified, in order to promote successful information retrieval.Objectives: This study identifies the Web search strategies used by postgraduate students and forms part of a wider study into information retrieval strategies used by postgraduate students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), Pietermaritzburg campus, South Africa. Method: Largely underpinned by Thatcher’s cognitive search strategies, the mixed-methods approach was utilised for this study, in which questionnaires were employed in Phase 1 and structured interviews in Phase 2. This article reports and reflects on the findings of P...
Uncovering Web search tactics in South African higher education
Background: The potential of the World Wide Web (‘the Web’) as a tool for information retrieval in higher education is beyond question. Harnessing this potential, however, remains a challenge, particularly in the context of developing countries, where students are drawn from diverse socio-economic, educational and technological backgrounds. Objectives: The purpose of this study is to identify the Web search tactics used by postgraduate students in order to address the weaknesses of undergraduate students with regard to their Web searching tactics. This article forms part of a wider study into postgraduate students’ information retrieval strategies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg campus, South Africa. Method: The study utilised the mixed methods approach, employing both questionnaires (Phase 1) and structured interviews (Phase 2), and was largely underpinned by Bates’s model of information search tactics. This article reports and reflects on the findings of Phase 1, which focused on identifying the Web search tactics employed by postgraduate students. Results: Findings indicated a preference for lower-level Web search tactics, despite respondents largely self-reporting as intermediate or expert users. Moreover, the majority of respondents gained their knowledge on Web searching through experience and only a quarter of respondents have been given formal training on Web searching. Conclusion: In addition to contributing to theory, it is envisaged that this article will contribute to practice by informing the design of undergraduate training interventions to proactively address the information retrieval challenges faced by novice users. Subsequent papers will report on Phase 2 of the study.
Postgraduate student success rate with free-form information searching. [0178]
The Internet has become a useful instrument in connecting users, regardless of their geographical locations, and has thus has made the world a small village where users can interact and search for information. Another aspect that has made the Internet popular amongst users, is its growing popularity as a global resource connecting millions of users surfing the Web daily, searching for and sharing information. A successful search for information depends on the user’s ability to search effectively, and this ability is based on computer competency, knowledge of Information Technology (IT), perceptions of IT usage, and the demographics of the user. These user’s characteristics tend to influence the overall user experience. Although the Internet is used by different groups of users to achieve different objectives of information search, not all of them achieve these objectives. The main aim of this study was to determine the success rate of post-graduate students using free-form information searching to find academic reference materials. Following a pilot study which indicated that the search success rate amongst postgraduate students is low, the survey method was used to collect primary data for the entire research project. The pilot study confirmed the definition of the research problem. Data was collected from Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT) postgraduate students. CPUT is the only university of technology in the Western Cape. A quantitative questionnaire, based on SurveyMonkey, was used for data collection and analysis. The findings of this study indicated that the postgraduate student search success rate has a lower than expected value when using free-form searching for academic information. Furthermore, although postgraduate students are moving away from the single-term-searching- syndrome, their success rate is still unacceptably low. However, this outcome is not surprising as the volume of Internet search is changing incrementally and this ever-growing information source has made it difficult to ascertain the quality and authenticity of information that is available to the users. Therefore, postgraduate students were found to be wasting a lot of time on fruitless searching, which affected their progress.
Searching for information sources: Students' behaviour in electronic environment
ICT is an important catalyst in transition from traditional to 21st century education. In the centre of our interests are students and their search for reliable information sources. The paper presents results of an online survey of all the students of Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb (FHSS). Analysis will show how they search for information in electronic environment while preparing exams and writing theses. Students' usage of library catalogue, commercial databases, open access repositories, open access journals, e-learning system, social networks, social bookmarking services, scientific blogs and forums will be analysed. Nine variables will be tested by chi-square test to show whether there are statistically significant differences in information searching behaviour between students of the Department of Information and Communication Sciences (DICS) and students of other departments at the faculty. All the results will show how important is formal...
A study of students’ information searching strategies
2010
Concerns have been expressed with respect to students' ability to search for information using electronic search engines and databases. This research adopted a structured method comprising a combination of questionnaire surveys, an observational study and a 'sense making'interview to assess the information searching skills of a group of 14 students undertaking their final year dissertation studies on undergraduate programmes within the Department of Civil and Building Engineering at Loughborough University. The findings ...