[Blog post by Adam Renfro, Virtual Learning Consultant]
Have you heard the one about the most depressing week of the year being the third week of January? Psychologists created a mathematical model that declared January 24th to be the epicenter of our funk. Check that out here on Wikipedia. They’ve even appropriately named it Blue Monday! And really, how could someone dispute something like this
when it comes to determining our mood?
Just the thought of that has made me a little more moody while I sit in my North Carolina ice cave this January. And the 24th is approaching.
But guess what? The Internet tells us that this is a meme that took flight before the power of the Google, MSN, and Yahoo (etc.) search engines were analyzed.
Bill Tancer, in his book Click: Unexpected Insights for Business and Life, explains that the most depressing week of the year happens right around Thanksgiving.
Okay, and how does he determine that? Simple: He studied the search habits of over 10 million American Internet users. I’m not sure how big the sample size was for the psychologist/mathematical model, but 10 million is, shall we say, a rather large sample size.
After he filtered out student searches for “The Great Depression” (apparently a nation-wide mandatory research paper since 1929) and included searchers for depression pharmaceuticals like Zoloft, Tancer found that “a significant number of us turned to our search engines the week of Thanksgiving in hopes of understanding our holiday blues.”
I’m only mildly concerned about depression as I watch ice-covered branches snap off trees in my backyard, but I am curious if we are paying enough attention to search analytics. While Tancer doesn’t completely answer “why” America searches about depression at Thanksgiving time (psychologists can still have a go at the “why”), he does lead us to the power of search analytics. It should be noted, though, that the searches do give an insight into the “why.” For example, “Why does a frozen turkey cost more than filling up my SUV with premium” might give us one of the “why” answers.
Therefore, do we understand search-engine analytics and how easy they are to access? What could students do with those analytics as they research material for class? What could districts do if they studied the search habits of students and teachers?
How interesting would it be for a science teacher if he or she knew a student had searched for “but why does E = mc2?” Imagine how much teachers could extend learning if they knew what students were searching for. Despite what we might think, today's students are still curious by nature.
Today’s students, let’s call them Generation Text, love that search engine. They might be reluctant to ask a question in class (“the nerd in the front row just asked why E = mc2”) , but they’re not afraid that the search engine will pass judgment on them. And if they’re like my own kids, they know that I have to google half the questions that they ask me anyhow.
Did you know that you can create your own custom Google search engine for your students? Set up is easy, and you can determine which sites are searched. This helps teachers keep students on task, and it’s very easy to add to the list of searchable sites. And, most importantly, if you embed the search engine into your own site, you can also turn on the analytics to see what students are searching for when they use it.
Follow this link to find out more about creating your own custom Google search engine: http://www.google.com/educators/p_cse.html
And be sure to celebrate during the week of January 24th. Despite what the model says, we survived Blue Monday months ago.
References
Tancer, B. (2008) Click: Unexpected Insights for Business and Life. New York: Hyperion.
Blue Monday: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Monday_(date)
Internet Meme: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme_(disambiguation)
Click: http://www.amazon.com/Click-Millions-People-Online-Matters/dp/1401323049/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1294764297&sr=1-6
Google Custom Search: http://www.google.com/educators/p_cse.html
