Custom Search Engines

Explain to students that the Trusted Source Search is a custom search engine: it uses Google, but only searches a limited number of sites.

Ask students: Why might it be helpful to only search some websites?

Explain that if you already know about some reliable sources on a subject you’re interested in – like dinosaurs, Disney, Pokémon, or the Titanic – you can save a lot of time by making a custom search engine that only searches them.

Have students access the student chapter Make a Custom Search Engine and go through it with the class.

You can choose to let each student pick a topic, have students work in groups, or have the whole class work together to find reliable sources on a topic related to other parts of the curriculum.

• If you choose either of the latter two options, you can make a shared list of reliable sources by compiling students’ suggestions.

Note that if students need Google accounts to actually make their own search engines, and accounts created by schools boards are generally not authorized to make them. If you want to make actual search engines you will most likely need to make or use your own Google account. See the backgrounder Custom Search Engines for information on how to do this.