How Xplana Use for SEO

Search engine optimization(SEO) is one of core element in Online Marketing these days, We identified its not enough businesses are incorporating an SEO strategy into their marketing efforts. Therefore we decide how we can use Xplana for the improve the efficiency of the work hours

It’s understandable — SEO Company Sri Lanka normally task oriented therefore we need to grab the key data for tracking the SEO campaign performance. we’ve aggregated some helpful visual aids so you can start to understand how SEO can be helpful in your business’ marketing strategy.

XplanaBook is a Flash-based media book platform that transforms text into integrated learning experiences for students who learning SEO. XplanaBook not only has advanced “book” tools such as index and glossary, but also boasts a unique user interface that affords readers ultimate flexibility in terms of their experience.

Search engine optimization is an inseparable portion of marketing for smaller businesses. Remember, SEO is a continuous procedure, so ask the firm or consultant how much it will cost to keep the website once the key changes are made. If you aren’t yet convinced that SEO is quite critical for each web business, the next message might help. SEO is excellent for the community promotion of your site. SEO means the search engine optimization that’s extremely useful to improve the amount of visitors of your site rapidly, onsite and offsite equally. Search engine marketing is the very best channel to acquire more leads for your company by getting your targeted keywords on top in the main search engines. SEO beats competition, that is the demand of the hour.

If a business is looking to profit on the company trends, among the most simple techniques to success is building a site. Many companies nowadays are offering affordable search engine marketing services on the internet. Many SEO businesses state they’ll supply a’ goal submit’ to find motors which is within the cost. There are a lot of SEO companies offering SEO experts services, which will provide a tremendous boost to your site by ensuring a greater search rank.

There are a sizable variety of search engine optimisation companies all around the world. The very best SEO provider encourages and allows a customised service program. It identifies the optimisation needs of a company.

Ask plenty of questions when you employ a search engine optimization company. An ideal SEO company may help businesses that run a site but don’t have any opportunity to resolve every complicated region of internet marketing strategies. An ideal search engine marketing company has to have a great reputation on the market along with have an immense experience. It can assist companies that run a website however have no time to fix every complicated location of on-line marketing approaches.

Every SEO provider works in a specific fashion and there’s a massive difference in their search engine optimization strategies. A Best SEO Company has to have an excellent reputation in the business and have a huge experience. It is crucial to employ dedicated SEO Company if you want to boost the visitors to your site.

Adaptive E-Learning: New Directions and Possibilities

Adaptive e-learning, taken to new levels by incorporating advances in other areas, such as interactive role-playing games, customizable avatars, guided presentation of content, just-in-time knowledge acquisition, CAT (computer adaptive testing), could bring about a total paradigm shift in online education. Imagine a truly individualized educational experience, with an AI mentor (in the guise of an avatar) that cues, requires feedback, research, and interactive just-in-time learning as students replicate the behaviors of successful games. Further, it could be the way to support the 500-student lecture experience, now a staple of bricks-and-mortar universities, without having to go to the labor- and cost-intensive online seminars, usually limited to 25 students, and crippled by low completion rates.

Where is adaptive e-learning today?

Adaptive e-learning is entering a new phase. After being fairly confined to lower-level tasks – randomly selecting content and/or test questions, programming repetitions in “skill and drill” types of activities, especially with voice recognition in language acquisition programs – the new adaptive e-learning programs are being deployed in a number of new venues, many of which involve large numbers of participants in distributed e-learning settings.

The military is using adaptive “smart” systems to help learners practice and adjust as they acquire skills, decision-making abilities, and cognitive self-awareness. Specific examples include the military’s use of adaptive e-learning over distributed systems to prepare soldiers for urban combat.

An example is detailed in J. R. Wilson’s “Adaptive Training,” Military Training Technology: Online Edition. Vol 8: Issue 1, Jan 1, 2003. The article describes how the adaptivity functions in the environment: “Because of the program’s AI, learners can move realistically through their own decision logic chain, where if the blue force element does one thing, the red force responds in an appropriate form. The gamers incorporated an “if-then-else” structure for the AI that makes the best use of the platform’s processing power to provide what Riley terms ‘a tremendous simulation to train leaders to think and react to situations and capture the asymmetric environment we see in our future.’”

CAT (computer adaptive testing) at a new level:

Adaptive e-learning is possible due to recent advances in computer adaptive testing. A leader in CAT is Thomson’s Prometrics, which has presented the following information on its website.

Prometric’s advanced testing technology can present exams as simulated or true-to-life scenarios. Engaging the test taker each step of the way results in a truer testing experience — and a more precise measure of knowledge, skills and abilities. Computer Adaptive Testing (CAT) aims to determine your level of competency by adapting each question to your previous response.

When you answer a question correctly, a more difficult question will appear. If you answer incorrectly, an easier question comes up. Each question’s level of difficulty is based on the answers to previous questions until a consistent level of competency is determined. Adaptive testing technology can establish this competency level more quickly than conventional examination techniques.

Part of the adaptivity of the e-learning environment has to do with using artificial intelligence in building programs that model and even predict a user’s learning styles, based on patterns forged by responses to questions.

Training Place (trainingplace.com) uses an initial instrument (a questionnaire) to “train” the program to begin to attune the delivery and content to the individual’s learning style.

As their website describes it, “The Learning Orientation Questionnaire (LOQ) and other diagnostic instruments are available to assess learning orientation, predict performance, match solutions, and support learning and performance improvements. The Learning Orientation Questionnaire provides scores that are unique indicators of the individual’s approach to learning and describes attributes that characterize learning ability.”

Adaptive e-learning as envisioned by programmers:

Programmers, particularly in aspects applied artificial intelligence, see how the new algorithms can be applied to distributed learning environments. Alex Pongpech writes in

“Adaptive e-Learning Considerations” that “the systems approach adopted here aims to compose e-courses-in a dynamic and adaptive manner-on the basis of learner profiling, using existing database and workflow technologies.”

Other programmers focus on the reusability of the elements. A good discussion of this approach and philosophy can be found here: “A Framework for Adaptive E-Learning Based on Distributed Re-usable Learning Activities,” by Peter Brusilovsky and Hemanta Nijhavan.

Although programmers tend to be enthusiastic, what tends to be missing is a team approach, which some of the innovative providers are assembling. Perhaps the most “leading edge” teams are being assembled by training providers to the military, closely followed by corporate training providers.

Higher education lags behind as community colleges, colleges, and universities tend to rely more heavily on content modules and reusable content objects (SCO’s) packaged and provided by their faculty, instructional design teams, textbook publishers, and independent content providers. The learning model tends to be driven by the learning management system (LMS) – WebCT, e-College, Blackboard, WebTycho, Desire2Learn, etc.

Perhaps it is a case of the cart leading the horse, the tail wagging the dog. At the very least, it tends to restrict learning experiences and place them in what has become the norm – a 25-student section of students, which is highly student- and faculty-time intensive. The prime determinant of quality in this model is faculty interaction.

The adaptive e-learning environment offers a glimmer of hope – it liberates students and faculty from a fairly rigid educational paradigm. Not only that, it allows the possibility of transcending class-size limits, and proposes a truly individualized educational experience, with an AI mentor (in the guise of an avatar) that cues, requires feedback, research, and interactive just-in-time learning as students replicate the behaviors of successful games.

Incorporating avatars in content delivery: online mentor cues and reviews

In order to envision how the adaptive e-learning environment would use avatar-based online mentors, we need to revisit the basics of customizable avatars.

Perhaps one of the best places to explore the way that avatars are allowing individuals to create a persona that expresses an individual’s sense of self is to visit There.com.

There.com allows subscribers to develop a personalized, customized avatar, and then to participate in various chats and scenarios – different “worlds.” The conversations and activities in the chat rooms are not limited by the constraints of a narrative-driven interactive game such as the Half-Life series, Tony Hawk, etc.

The games, however, provide a glimpse of how learning can take place in an avatar-guided environment. For example, when the learner progresses to certain stages or points, the online mentor asks the learner to do certain performative tasks, which could include

        ---provide responses to questions

        ---search the online library or on the internet for information that will allow the learner to progress

        ---ask self-reflective questions

        ---go to a discussion board and post questions or responses

The goal of the online mentor is to break up the mode of learning and move away from simply reading on the screen to a more interactive one, which taps into other learning styles, such as auditory, kinaesthetic, or visual.

Just-in-Time delivery of knowledge to enhance problem-solving and deeper learning:

At the International Conference of Educational Multimedia held in March 2004 in Quebec City, Quebec, keynote speaker James Gee described how just-in-time learning occurs in interactive, multi-participant, multi-level video games.

Describing the Tony Hawks series of interactive video games which involve creating a persona who progresses through levels of skateboarding challenges, Dr. Gee explained that the learning takes place in a seamless, unforced, and deep manner.

For example, in order to solve problems to progress to the next level, or to acquire necessary skills, the learner must search, retrieve, and understand the information. This is not done in a way that involves rote memorization, or “skill and drill.” Instead, it represents a very productive manner of just-in-time knowledge acquisition.

The most popular of the interactive games, the Half-Life series, illustrates this as well. By creating and maintaining a persona, a profound identification process is set in motion. The learner identifies with the persona, and begins to internalize the worlds, details, and values found in the world. Although this is not precisely a simulation, there is a sense that there is experiential learning at work.

In the case of adaptive e-learning, the key to successful just-in-time knowledge acquisition, is that it is focused on learning goals. Further, the relevance and usefulness of the task as well as the knowledge should be made apparent. Finally, the lesson of interactive video games includes, as Dr. Gee points out, not just projection, but entertainment in a sensory-rich environment.

Attuning content delivery and assessment to learner’s interests:

Using some of the same algorithms, one may be able to develop a decision tree to allow the program to “learn” the students interests, based on his/her responses. Of a menu of 5 or 6 possibilities, the content could then presented in such a way that it makes connections to the learner’s interests, background, experience base, and professional orientation. Attuning could focus on various aspects and could include military, professional avocations, education, hobbies, gender, ethnicity, etc.

After the learner responds to key questions and/or directions, then the content, questions, and assessment would be presented to correlate with the learner’s attributes. This personalization could help with identification, as well as make the content relevant. Both factors could result in a greatly enhanced learning experience, with higher completion rates, and outcomes. Learnframe.com is one such provider of services.

By being flexible, and providing an individualized experience, adaptive e-learning offers significant breakthroughs, which could result in not only a better (more effective) educational experience, marked by deeper learning. It also holds out the promise of a more inclusive, culturally-responsive approach, as well as enhanced access.

If students can enroll in learning “on demand,” and are not constrained by class size, many doors are opened. Further, faculty can spend time developing content, assessing, and interacting with students in guided discussion rooms. It is a way to accommodate large numbers of students, and to perhaps begin to eliminate some of the more ineffective or unrealistic delivery methods (giant lecture hall, etc.).

For those who are concerned that there should be more human interaction in order to provide a chance to mentor and to correct possible misapprehensions, the adaptive e-learning strategy could incorporate a guided, scripted scenario where students, via their own avatars, must enact certain roles and/or accomplish proscribed tasks. In addition, learners can be required to go online and post discussion items in learner forums, and they could write a final paper, if it makes sense with respect to course objectives.

Xplana Course

XplanaCourse is a standards-based LMS platform designed to deliver the highest quality online learning experience. XplanaCourse is unique in its collection of collaboration and communication tools as well as in its assortment of content management functionality. It is a system designed to reinforce best-practices instructional design and foster active reflection and sharing within student communities. XplanaCourse allows instructors to create both traditional and more extensive activities and assessments that can be exported for use with other LMS platforms.

XplanaWorkbook

XplanaWorkbook is a robust homework management solution that provides extensive class management tools as well as a true-to-page representation of a printed workbook. 

XplanaWorkbook is a robust homework management solution that provides extensive class management tools as well as a true-to-page representation of a printed workbook. The XplanaWorkbook allows instructors to create courses, manage course sections, assign activities and create new ones. It also provides the necessary management tools to teach an entire course online. All content in the XplanaWorkbook is SCORM compliant, and both learning objects and grades are exportable to other standards-compliant systems.

XplanaVoice

XplanaVoice is a voice-based communication and collaboration tool that can function as a stand-alone application or as an integrated module to other Xplana products such as XplanaCourse and XplanaWorkbook. It can be integrated to support existing publisher and instructor websites, and delivers full-featured asynchronous voice communication options over low and high bandwidth connections. XplanaVoice utilizes Macromedia Flash Communication Server technology to provide the most dynamic yet flexible feature set possible for the education market.

XplanaBook

XplanaBook is a Flash-based media book that transforms traditional textbooks into interactive learning experiences for students.

XplanaBook is a Flash-based media book platform that transforms traditional textbooks into integrated learning experiences for students. XplanaBook not only has advanced “book” tools such as index and glossary, but also boasts a unique user interface that affords readers ultimate flexibility in terms of their experience. All media and assessment types can be embedded seamlessly into XplanaBook, and the platform integrates seamlessly with our XplanaCourse LMS platform.

Writing for Real Audiences on the Web

So, back to the problem of jibber-jabber. What is it that students are complaining about with the jibber-jabber? It is not the jibber-jabber itself, clearly: just take a look at ICQ and chat messaging abbreviations – talk about jibber-jabber! The problem is instead the students’ failure to understand the computer jargon or computer procedures, and the deep-seated fear of failure that haunts the school environment.

Many students still think their primary goal in school is to avoid failure. To never make a mistake. There are not many students who can regard their purpose in school as learning (including learning through their mistakes)… and you cannot blame them. You almost always get graded on what you know, which is not necessarily the same as being graded on what you have learned. And there are all kinds of things that students have to learn about in order to succeed when using online courseware – things that they did not need to know for school before.

Think about the typical classroom experience. You have to show up on time: that’s about the only thing you can fail at. You are not going to fail at getting into the building, opening the classroom door, sitting in your seat, and maintaining a more or less vertical posture for the next 50 or 75 minutes. If you can physically set yourself in motion (i.e., get out of bed), the odds of success are high! Admittedly, we do not offer a lot of overt praise for students’ success in arriving at the classroom, but it is at least a small kind of success. It is certainly not a failure. Imagine if at least four or five times a semester, you went to sit down in your chair in the classroom and the chair broke into pieces and you were left sitting on your ass in the middle of the classroom. Failure. In public. Awful!

Yet that public failure is just what happens with computer-based course management systems. At least that is what happens at my school, where we use Blackboard as our course management system. Several times a semester, the students go to take their seat in Blackboard and something horrible happens. Sometimes it is a result of their own technical error, sometimes it is a system error. In any case, there are technical difficulties, and you need some technical knowledge to sort out and respond to those difficulties when they arise.

But instead, the students often react to those problems with a sense of personal failure. “I can’t do anything on the computer.” “I did something wrong.” “I broke Blackboard.”

Instead of saying, “What is wrong here?”, they ask – sometimes explicitly – “What is wrong with me?”

Then, in a natural reaction to this sense of failure, they push the experience away. The computer is “jibber-jabber”, it is meaningless, it is dangerous, stay away, or you might fail. As the student said in the fairy tale he wrote for class yesterday: “If you can�t code the button, you fail.” (Interestingly, this student, who is clearly very hard on himself when it comes to computing, is also extremely hard on other students in the class, making the most harsh comments about the other students’ projects, chastising them very strongly for any technical difficulties they are having with their webpages.)

The threat of failure… or at least of the feeling of failure. It is a risk that comes with the use of any computer-based course management systems. By using a CMS to supplement, or even replace, the traditional classroom, we have to be aware that we are asking students to do more. And that means we are asking them to risk more: to risk failure. And that is a risk that many students have learned – through years of schooling – to avoid at all costs. Why take risks? The most important thing is to avoid failing…

So how can we justify asking students to do more, to risk more? Well, we have to offer them greater rewards! Unfortunately, the only kind of reward that we officially recognize in school is usually grades. For some students, a course management system might offer a way to get better grades: because it adapts to a wider range of cognitive learning styles and can offer different kinds of learning activities, students might embrace a computer-based course management system in the hopes of getting higher grades.

But I doubt it.

And that’s the wrong game to play, after all. Those of us who are committed to computer-based course management systems need to have loftier goals than higher grades: we need to challenge ourselves as teachers to use these new tools to offer our students much more than that. We need to offer them real learning opportunities, different and better than the learning opportunities that they had before… learning opportunities that will give students the same sense of intrinsic satisfaction and self-motivated pleasure that they feel when using cell phones and video games and online chat, which students clearly enjoy despite the jibber-jabber.

The next question: what kinds of things can students do online that will lead that sense of intrinsic satisfaction? how can we make online learning worth the risk?

Digital Makerting Company Sri Lanka Partnership With xPlna

Today, digital marketing services are commonly available in the global market. With the increased adoption of the internet, advertising and marketing has become more convenient and lucrative. The best part about this business venture is that it provides immense opportunities for businesses in terms of scale and quality.

As the nature of the service has changed, so has the way of working. It no longer just focuses on the creation of copy and presentation. Today, it deals with all aspects of promotional activities in the form of internet marketing Sri Lanka.

Digital marketing Sri Lanka has helped a lot of business organizations set up their online presence and ensure success in their line of business. They have maintained the contact with the consumers online and reduced their marketing cost significantly. The digital marketing strategy has now become one of the most effective tools in establishing business.

Advantages of the digital marketing service Sri Lanka

One of the prime advantages of the digital marketing service is that it can be used across a wide range of sectors. It can be applied to a specific sector or business sector by providing unique content and in-depth research on the local users. The professional SEO team works towards the promotion of a product or brand through the right keywords.

Proper SEO marketing Sri Lanka team can help businesses raise the visibility of a website which in turn helps them to reach the potential customers. Moreover, the strategies help in improving the traffic of a website through a well-designed and up-to-date website which has been designed in accordance with the latest web design Sri Lanka. This enables online consumers to easily find out about a company and get informed about the products and services provided by the company.

Businesses also use marketing tactics like product sampling, promotions, video posting, article posting, social media marketing, blog posting and press release to promote their products and services. These are some of the techniques used by digital marketing team to bring people online. Through proper research and a careful assessment of the current trends, SEO experts can help businesses to take care of their customers online.

Content Marketing is Important For Digital Growth

Content development on the other hand is another area where it offers lots of benefits. This is the technique which involves using rich content to promote a particular business or brand. Through this strategy, businesses can engage consumers online and make them aware about the brand’s products and services.

Online marketing is now becoming increasingly popular and is rapidly getting adoption by all kinds of businesses. In this type of marketing campaign, companies use SEO experts to gain visibility in the online arena. Some of the latest methods employed are search engine optimization, pay per click, link building, blog commenting, social networking and website promotion.

There are many business owners who are not comfortable with the concept of marketing. With the technology is developing at an exponential rate, the importance of marketing in business has become essential. Therefore, even if you don’t have any idea how to start with online marketing, you should not hesitate to join a digital marketing Sri Lanka agency.

Since the practice of digital marketing is not easy, it requires special skills, knowledge and patience. So if you don’t have the time and don’t want to take the risk, you can opt for virtual marketing. Virtual marketing works on the basis of targeting keywords to gain the maximum exposure to the target audience.

This kind of marketing has gained a lot of popularity among global clients. According to some studies, virtual marketing has increased the reach of businesses in the global market. Since it is not possible to launch campaigns and other activities such as surveys to gain more exposure, these agencies provide these services.

If you want to promote your business online, it is best to choose a digital marketing service that will help you find the right keywords, provide data and monitor their usage, improve websites and optimize the search engines. Professional SEO experts are the key role in the process and they assist you in creating and maintaining a positive digital reputation.

Fear of Failure in the World of Online Learning

So, back to the problem of jibber-jabber. What is it that students are complaining about with the jibber-jabber? It is not the jibber-jabber itself, clearly: just take a look at ICQ and chat messaging abbreviations – talk about jibber-jabber! The problem is instead the students’ failure to understand the computer jargon or computer procedures, and the deep-seated fear of failure that haunts the school environment.Many students still think their primary goal in school is to avoid failure. To never make a mistake. There are not many students who can regard their purpose in school as learning (including learning through their mistakes)… and you cannot blame them. You almost always get graded on what you know, which is not necessarily the same as being graded on what you have learned. And there are all kinds of things that students have to learn about in order to succeed when using online courseware – things that they did not need to know for school before.Think about the typical classroom experience. You have to show up on time: that’s about the only thing you can fail at. You are not going to fail at getting into the building, opening the classroom door, sitting in your seat, and maintaining a more or less vertical posture for the next 50 or 75 minutes. If you can physically set yourself in motion (i.e., get out of bed), the odds of success are high! Admittedly, we do not offer a lot of overt praise for students’ success in arriving at the classroom, but it is at least a small kind of success. It is certainly not a failure. Imagine if at least four or five times a semester, you went to sit down in your chair in the classroom and the chair broke into pieces and you were left sitting on your ass in the middle of the classroom. Failure. In public. Awful!Yet that public failure is just what happens with computer-based course management systems. At least that is what happens at my school, where we use Blackboard as our course management system. Several times a semester, the students go to take their seat in Blackboard and something horrible happens. Sometimes it is a result of their own technical error, sometimes it is a system error. In any case, there are technical difficulties, and you need some technical knowledge to sort out and respond to those difficulties when they arise.But instead, the students often react to those problems with a sense of personal failure. “I can’t do anything on the computer.” “I did something wrong.” “I broke Blackboard.”Instead of saying, “What is wrong here?”, they ask – sometimes explicitly – “What is wrong with me?”Then, in a natural reaction to this sense of failure, they push the experience away. The computer is “jibber-jabber”, it is meaningless, it is dangerous, stay away, or you might fail. As the student said in the fairy tale he wrote for class yesterday: “If you can�t code the button, you fail.” (Interestingly, this student, who is clearly very hard on himself when it comes to computing, is also extremely hard on other students in the class, making the most harsh comments about the other students’ projects, chastising them very strongly for any technical difficulties they are having with their webpages.)The threat of failure… or at least of the feeling of failure. It is a risk that comes with the use of any computer-based course management systems. By using a CMS to supplement, or even replace, the traditional classroom, we have to be aware that we are asking students to do more. And that means we are asking them to risk more: to risk failure. And that is a risk that many students have learned – through years of schooling – to avoid at all costs. Why take risks? The most important thing is to avoid failing…So how can we justify asking students to do more, to risk more? Well, we have to offer them greater rewards! Unfortunately, the only kind of reward that we officially recognize in school is usually grades. For some students, a course management system might offer a way to get better grades: because it adapts to a wider range of cognitive learning styles and can offer different kinds of learning activities, students might embrace a computer-based course management system in the hopes of getting higher grades.But I doubt it.And that’s the wrong game to play, after all. Those of us who are committed to computer-based course management systems need to have loftier goals than higher grades: we need to challenge ourselves as teachers to use these new tools to offer our students much more than that. We need to offer them real learning opportunities, different and better than the learning opportunities that they had before… learning opportunities that will give students the same sense of intrinsic satisfaction and self-motivated pleasure that they feel when using cell phones and video games and online chat, which students clearly enjoy despite the jibber-jabber.The next question: what kinds of things can students do online that will lead that sense of intrinsic satisfaction? how can we make online learning worth the risk?
 

Why Search Matters — How to Help People Find Their Way in the Community

n the mid-nineties I was traveling in Brazil and, one day, I was invited to a birthday party by a friend of a friend of a friend. Not having anything better to do that evening, I borrowed a car and set out for the other side of Campinas. I had been told that the house I was looking for was on the city’s outskirts, but no one mentioned that it was also beyond the boundary where there were any street signs. 

All I had was a street address in a neighborhood that was on the other side of the little river (those were the exact words on my directions — “On the other side of the little river”). As I looked out over the river, I could make out several neighborhoods amidst what had to have been more than 100,000 people. 
Always the intrepid traveler, however, I crossed over and began asking people about the neighborhood and street. The amazing thing is that, in spite of the fact that there was not one street sign in this whole big and winding place, it took me only four questions to arrive at my destination. It would have taken only three questions if I hadn’t misunderstood one man’s Portuguese.

As I have thought about this over the years, it has become clearer to me and less amazing. The key to being able to find this place that had no street signs was that I had a general location and was able to rely on the fact that everyone else inside the general area knew exactly where they were. I could also count on the fact that their knowledge extended to just slightly beyond their own location.

Much in the same way that we are all separated from each other by no more than six degrees (or from Kevin Bacon), we are separated from our desired destinations by no more than a few (perhaps six?) questions or contacts.

This reflection is intended to be an illustration of some of the issues related to searching on the Web and to point out why search engines are getting so much play in the press these days.

There are a couple of forces at work. First, the big companies realize that searching is the quickest way to add users to their services and to sell advertising on the Web. As a result, big search engines/portals like MSN, Yahoo, and Google are battling it out for searching supremacy. On the corporate search front, company’s like InQuira, Verity, and Overture are trying to carve out a niche. Each promises to provide a search technology that will get you where you want to go faster and with greater accuracy than anyone else.

From a bottom-up perspective, community is driving the push for better search technology. Those of us using the various search engines are just trying to get across the river to a little place where something neat is happening and we want a little help. The search engines are the compilation of the knowledge of all those people who live on the other side and know where they are.

So, I need information and searching makes it possible for me to get that information. But there is more — much more. The real joy of searching is not just found in getting to my intended destination, it is in the conversations and links to the people and information sources that make the discovery process possible.

This is one of the reasons blogging and aggregated news feeds are so popular. These technologies provide us a much more enjoyable search model.. We can find our primary information sources, but we can also find important pathways, commentary, and relationships along the way.

For educators, searching has the obvious importance as a research tool. But it is equally, if not more important as a community tool. Search engines, top-down or bottom-up, are a method for connecting us to others faster, for expanding our boundaries. As such, there are some tips to keep in mind, both as we build out own information sources and as we connect to those belonging to others.

  • Identify your material carefully and accurately — The neighborhood (your school, institution, or ISP) can worry about the “street signs,” but you can make sure that your “house” is uniquely identified and beautiful. Tag your HTML, make meaningful titles — do anything you can to make your knowledge useful to other users. Identifying yourself also means that you let people know what your “house” has to offer and what information is unique to you. It will save others a lot of time and it will connect you more tightly to the community.; 
  • Be a good neighbor with handy information — One way to do this is to act, “virtually,” as one of those people along the side of the road that one might stop to ask for information. Anticipate those requests and make the information readily available (especially if people are always stopping to ask the same questions). Notice that the Link Library in Xplana tries to serve this function. This is a collection of “answers sites” that we’ve used over the years to help people. In the same way, we try to provide helpful links within our articles and white papers. 
  • Take the time to talk to others — Search engines are automated logic schemas and bots. Communities are full of conversation. Both have their merits. As part of the community, invite people to talk to you. We have comment pages and discussion built into our engine. On every blog you’ll find an e-mail link (that’s an invitation to talk). Make certain people can find you and ask you a question. In this way you become part of the “personal global search engine community.” 
  • Do what you can to help traffic flow — It’s one thing to et people to their appointed destination. It is altogether something different to get them there efficiently. I used to write culture guides and activities for foreign language textbooks. For each of these guides I would create activities based on Web links. You cannot imagine how hard it can be to find good links on even the most basic subjects. The solutions, inevitably, came from good citizens who, along the way, had experienced the same difficulty and left a “trail” for me to follow. You can save people an inordinate amount of time by just telling them the shortest route to a place, or to turn “left” instead of “right.”

Searching is, perhaps, the most educational aspect related to Internet technology. It is also a great community builder. The key for all of us to remember that we are both “travelers” of the systems as well s information sources for others. Playing both roles with empathy makes the system perfect for everyone.