It beats that dusty old set of encyclopaedias (From Worcester News)

It beats that dusty old set of encyclopaedias

GONE are the days when pupils had to raid their parents’ dusty old Encyclopaedia Britannicas to complete their homework.

It beats that dusty old set of encyclopaedias

With the internet revolution, children can now simply tap the subject they are researching into a search engine such as Google or Ask and up comes hundreds of websites that can help them.

But there is a problem with this. The searches that come up aren’t always relevant or from a trusted source, so how can you know that what your child is clicking on will help them or be a safe website?

One company in Worcester seems to have the answer.

Gemsta.com, a firm based in Wildwood Drive, near County Hall, Worcester, recently launched a 3D search and shopping website. Now it has come up with a colourful and child-friendly search engine that it is unveiling for the whole country to use for free.

The new online homework section of its MultiSearch tool – which allows users to search multiple sites at once – gives children and parents access to a huge wealth of information in an easy-to-browse format. Searchable links include the BBC, National Geographic and Oxford University as well as search engines such as Google and Bing.

The homework tool also provides parents and teachers with the extra reassurance that only selected sites will be searched, and unsuitable sites are automatically filtered out.

Richard Laing, chief executive of Gemsta.com, said the site could be used to help primary-school-aged children navigate the busy and often overwhelming world of the web.

Mr Laing said: “Children are using the internet more and more for homework, research and actively within lessons. But watching my own children use the internet for homework it worries me that the whole class is probably going to the same single search engine and are therefore getting the same results.

“The perceived choice available online is all too often missed because whilst Google is a great search engine, it is only one source for information – there is much more out there for kids if only they knew where to look.”

Mr Laing and his team have also had input from a number of teachers so they know they are on the right track when it comes to the layout, design and content to help children engage with their work.

Nikki Rhodes, a year 6 teacher who lives in Redditch and teaches in Leamington Spa, was asked to view the pages and show to her class.

She said: “The way it looks appeals immediately to the children and they are able to interact with it, almost like a computer game they are all used to. When I showed it to them they were immediately taken with it. As far as homework is concerned, while they are used to going away and researching a subject for their homework and bringing it back to class, a lot of the time it is very similar.

“What I love about the site is that you can go on and select which search engines you want to use by ticking them. Some of them, such as the National Geographic site, the odd child may know about it. But this lets others find out about the sites that are really useful.

“While schools do have exact books for topics, this is a way for them to go away and do some research themselves.

“Teachers rely on interactive whiteboards and any time of day I can go onto the internet and get links. Children too can show us what they have found, and it may be a fact that they have found something different to their classmates that they can teach them, and they are then more likely to remember that fact.

“With more and more teachers using the internet to teach, Gemsta really is a tool that I will be using in my classroom.”

Mr Laing said: “It is a way to use the internet in a more engaging way. We use the 3D format to make learning more engaging – such as the solar system. It is so easy for children to learn as there is such a lot of information out there that we want them to find and use.”

MultiSearch allows users to search multiple websites simultaneously for their homework topic, arranging results in an easy to compare tabbed format. Set within Gemsta’s 3D environment, homework is one of eight areas which also includes web, image, multimedia, news, maps, travel and extensive shopping.

Future versions will allow teachers, parents and children to design their own personal homework help by selecting their favourite sites and creating their own MultiSearch areas. Also in development is a toolbar which will allow you to quickly archive and organize search results which you can go back to at a later date for revision or further learning.

To use the homework search, see search.gemsta.com/homework.