This lesson teaches searching skills using Boolean operators. The teacher helps the students understand the concept by demonstrating the operators based on students themselves and their looks or clothing. Then they move on to a graphic organizer and then to actual topical searching. Can be done with any topic for a research project.

1.       Students will complete at least four rows of the graphic organizer using descriptors and Boolean operators as connectors.

2.       Students will accurately predict the outcome of various Boolean operators 75% of the time.

3.       Students will find three appropriate sources for their topic from Internet searches and three from database searches by doing searches where they combine at least two terms for each search.

-          Graphic organizer (see Supporting Files)

-          White board

-          Computer terminals for all students to work independently

DAY ONE 

Part One - Put the words of the Boolean operators, “and, or, not” on a white board along with a circle for each member of the class.  The TL will demonstrate the use of the operators with the students themselves.  She will ask the students who have brown hair to stand up, for example.  She will mark off the number of circles corresponding to the number of students who are sitting. 

 

 

Then she will ask the students with brown hair AND who are wearing blue shirts to remain standing.  She will then mark off the corresponding circles.  She will explain that using the AND connector is reducing the number of people in the set. 

 

 

She will continue to use this type of demonstration for the other connectors of OR and NOT, showing how the sets get bigger or smaller correspondingly.  As time goes on, she will prompt the students to guess what is going to happen with one of the Boolean operators so that they anticipate the change.

 

Part Two – The TL distributes the attached graphic organizer/worksheet which shows examples of operations with Boolean operators.  The TL asks the students to practice using the operators in Google, writing down the search results for each combination of operators that the students use.   In this section, she will start using terms from the research project, like “colonies AND American NOT Virginia” and other similar examples.

 

Part Three – During the last 5-10 minutes of class the TL will bring the group back together to discuss results with the students.  She will also remind them that they will be using this lesson in their lesson the next day when they will be actually using their colonial topics as their search terms.

 

DAY TWO

 

Part One – The TL will review the Boolean operators that were handled in yesterday’s class, reminding the students the effect of AND making sets smaller, etc.  Now, she will encourage the students to come up with search terms that they will use in the topic to research.  She will hand out the same graphic organizer that was used yesterday and ask the student to begin filling in examples of search terms that they will use in the research topic.  Also, the TL will encourage the students to use a thesaurus to look up terms that they may not have thought of in their descriptors.

 

Part Two – The students will work independently at the computer terminals.  While the students are working independently, the TL will circulate through the students.  She will make sure that the students are doing their searches appropriately, making suggestions as appropriate, always looking to enhance the student’s understanding and learning. 

 

Praise should be given to students who are being successful in their work, and the TL should also encourage some discussion between individual students to share some of their new understandings with each other.

1. Have the students met the objectives as outlined above?
2. Is the TL satisfied with the understanding of the lesson of the students after observing their work?
3. Is the CT satisfied with the sources that the students have identified for further use in their research papers?

classroom teacher