Power Searching Benefits

During this unit of computer applications, I have learned  many different ways that I can improve on searching with Google and finding better results faster. One of ways that I personally have benefited from learning some of the shortcuts on Google are Ctrl + F which will make a search menu pop up on your screen. This will allow you to type any word into that search box and it will go to the places on the web page where it has that word, if it has it. I have used this in the past if I was working on a DBQ or a type of research paper. The second benefit of this course that I have learned was the "" searching operator. I have used the quotes in the past by when I was searching my name on the internet to see what the results would be. When searching my name I thought it would be important to use the quotes because I have a baseball park with the same name as my last name and some of the results might be for that. I have also used the quotes when I hear a song that I don't know the name of and I type the lyrics that I know and put quotes around it.

Power Searching

           After finishing all 3 classes of the Google power searching course, I have learned some pretty interesting tricks and ways to filter my search and to get to the desired websites faster. In the 1st class, two interesting things that I have learned are that if you are looking for something that is a certain color, you can go to the box of colors on the results page and select the one that you are looking for. The second interesting thing that I have learned about in Class 1 is how when you come up with your results page full of images, you can hover over a certain image with you mouse, then click related images to come up with a page full of images close to that specific one.
            In the second class, I had learned  about how important it is to make sure there are not any useless words in your query. This can lead to unnecessary topics being searched and you being not as accurate as possible. In Class 2 we also learned about how the order of the words can make a big difference. For example, if you searched spider flower and had the order as flower spider, that is a completely different thing.
           In Class 3 we learned about these things called operators. These are pretty much just things that you put in your query that help you find what you are looking for faster and more precisely. The first type of operator that I found important was the :. In your query, you type what you are looking for then : and a type of website like.gov, .edu, .com, etc. Also, when you put that ending there the period is optional to add in. Your final search might look like this, Olympics site:.gov. The last thing that I found important and that would be useful to me and maybe even you is the quotes in your search. Putting quotes around your query makes it so those exact words in that order are searched. This might be useful if you are trying to find the name of a song but you only know the lyrics. Also, the OR operator is helpful because you put it between 2 different words in your query to make the search results page have both of those categories in it. ex, Snowboarding OR skiing.

Winter Track

             There aren't many winter sports here at RMHS that are relaxed and fun to do, this is why I decided to do winter track. My brother is also the captain so he might have influenced me in my decision. For the races that I would do, I decided to run the 300 meter race. I was not that great at it but was pretty good comparing to the other freshman. One aspect that made track fun for me is that I had some of my friends do it too and that made it more enjoyable for me. Some of the kids running would decide that they would be hurt so they wouldn't have to do the workout (Troy Tully). This kid had even backed out of the last meet because he had "pulled his back" and then he was fine to go skiing two days later. Him and I are acquaintances so I don't think he would be mad if I talked about how bad he was. Sometimes, when we have to run hills, he even says that he is sick so he won't have to continue with the grueling workout.