TECHNOLOGY: Gateways, Portals, and Websites
SEARCHING the Internet for K-12 educational materials using a multipurpose search engine like Google is a waste of time. The educational materials you are looking for will be all mixed in with millions of noneducational materials. Fortunately, there are better ways. You can use a gateway or portal website designed strictly for educators. I have not found a clear distinction between how people use the terms “gateway” and “portal.” The word “portal” means door or special entrance. My university website, for example, has a special portal page that faculty members use to access class lists, grade rolls, and so forth. I believe that “gateway” usually refers to a website that maintains a database of resources you can search. The distinction here, however, is artificial, since nearly all large websites have their content stored in a “back end” database — i.e., one that you don’t see. Regardless of the term you use, there are two generic ways to give educators access to content. You can either maintain a database of educational materials that can be searched, or you can organize the content in some kind of directory or hierarchical structure — not unlike the outlines you used to give your English teacher. Either of these approaches is far better than using a multipurpose search engine that accesses the entire Web. GEM or Gateway to Educational Materials (www.geminfo.org) is an initiative of the U.S. Department of Education. GEM is currently housed at the Information Institute of Syracuse University. The purpose of this particular gateway is to expand educators’ capability to access Internet-based lesson plans, curriculum units, and other educational materials. GEM’s goal is to improve the organization and accessibility of the substantial, but uncataloged, collections of materials that are already available on various federal, state, university, nonprofit, and commercial Internet sites. When teachers connect to The Gateway, they are able to access the educational resources of participating GEM Consortium members. When educators connect . . . they are able to: browse through lists organized by subject, keyword, or grade/education level; search by subject, keyword, title, or full-text of the resource’s catalog record, [and] go directly to the resource from The Gateway. The introductions continue: GEM is a set of metadata standards [explained below] used by Consortium members to organize and improve access to their own educational materials. Sites ‘Powered by GEM’ include: AskERIC, Canadian Heritage Information Network’s Learning with Museums, MCI WorldCom Foundation’s MarcoPolo Project, NASA Space Science Education Resource Directory, and the U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Resources for Educational Excellence. Since this was written and posted, many new members have been added to the Consortium, including Disney, PBS, and National Geographic. A metadata record is a “record about a record,” or in this use, a database record of a Web page or resource. The GEM metadata record is similar to a card in a library catalog, with many similar fields, such as a keyword field. Since I will be teaching an elementary science methods class this fall, I decided to test the GEM Gateway to find information about biomes and habitats. There are a variety of ways to set up a GEM search, but I will explain only a few here. The GEM search page lets you search on two variables, and you can search the database by full text, keyword, title, or description. I found that the best way to search the GEM gateway is to use either “title” or “keywords.” (Keywords are simply the controlled vocabulary used to describe entries.) These options were the most useful since they are more restrictive, and you don’t have to browse through so many hits. You can also restrict your search to a single grade level or choose several. And you can specify a “broad field” or school subject, such as science, and a “narrow field,” such as ecology.
