Finding Science Information on the Web.

Start by making a bookmark of this page so that you can easily return. Click on "Bookmarks" and then on "Add Bookmark".

Using the AltaVista Search Engine

AltaVista is like the index in a book. If you are looking for a specific idea, this is a great place to go. Be Warned, you will probably find more sites than you can look at in a lifetime. So if you don't find what you want right away, change your search parameters.

You are working on a science project on astronomy and would like to see some images from a telescope. The Hubble Space Telescope is a NASA telescope that orbits the earth and takes very good pictures. Since this is a rather specific topic, AltaVista is a good place to look. So let's find some stuff.

  1. Start by going to AltaVista and searching for "hubble telescope".
  2. Look at description and URL for information about the locations.
  3. Change the search to "hubble telescope nasa" (this is a bit more specific and should turn up some better hits).
  4. You can remove the last part of a URL to move up in directory
  5. Go to the image gallery and take a look.

Yahoo

Yahoo is like a table of contents. If you are looking for information in a specific category, this is a great place to look. You can use Yahoo by going through the directory listings, this is like sorting through a tree, to find the category you are interested in. Or you can search for a category. When you use a search, look closely at what a category is listed under it will tell you what kind of information you'll find. When you do a search, Yahoo will return a listing of relevant Yahoo categories and a list of Yahoo sites.

For example, if you were doing a report on volcano's. Yahoo is a great place to start.

  1. Go to Yahoo and search for "volcano"
  2. Look at the different categories and see what they tell you.
  3. Select the "Science: Earth Sciences: Geology and Geophysics: Volcanology" category.
  4. The category contains a listing of subcategories and a listing of web sites. Look at the descriptions.
  5. Go to "Volcano World" and check out:
    1. Teaching & Learning
    2. Online Education
    3. Eruption Simulation
    4. Mt St Helens
    5. Volcanos of the world
  6. Video Clips

Your Turn

Below are some topics that may be of interest, pick one and see what you can find.

  1. Global Warming
  2. Earthquakes
  3. Sharks
  4. Dinosaur
  5. Ozone Hole

Some Interesting Sites

  1. The Why Files. National Science Foundation (NSF) Sponsored site that highlights the science behind items in the news.
  2. You Can Home of Beakman Place and Jax Place's.
  3. Discovery Channel 6-8 Science and Math
  4. NASA Mission to Planet Earth FAQ's. FAQ's are "Frequently Asked Questions". This site is part of NASA's Mission to Planet Earth, which studies the atmosphere and the environment.
  5. TOMS Movies. TOMS is the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer, a satellite that measures the ozone concentrations in the atmosphere.
  6. Franklin Institute
  7. GLOBE Program . Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment. This is an international program to monitor the environment. Students from around the world provide data.
  8. SkyLinks: Astronomy- and Space-Related Web Sites. Astronomy resources on the web from Sky & Telescope magazine.
  9. EPA Ozone Home Page

More Information about Finding and Evaluating Web Resources

Pepper
Middle
School
This page is maintained by
Scott Van Bramer
Department of Chemistry
Widener University
Chester, PA 19013

Please send any comments, corrections, or suggestions to svanbram@science.widener.edu.

This page has been accessed times since 5/25/97.
Last Updated Wednesday, May 28, 1997 09:03:50