discovery by browsing (navigation)

 Initiating discovery by browsing

Sometimes it is best to start a search by browsing from the master facet list when you really aren't sure of any terms that might describe the resources you want to find or if you are just interested in getting a feel for what is in the Gateway.  Here are the steps for browsing the master facet lists:

1.  To start a search by browsing, go to the center of the Gateway to 21^st Century Skills home page.  You will see a blue button, next to the “Find Resources” button marked “+ Browse”.   The «subject» facet is open by default.  Clicking on the blue “+Browse” button will open a list of additional facets.  Notice the "show" arrow to the right of each of the listed facets.  Clicking the “show” arrow will open each facet.

2.  Notice that there is a number in parenthesis beside each term in the facet list. That number tells us how many resources in the Gateway have been assigned that term. Each of those words and phrases in the facet list is a link to descriptions of the resources that have been assigned that word or phrase

3.  Click on the "Science" term in the «subject» facet list.

4.  In the center column of the screen, you are looking at the short display of descriptions of only those educational resources in the Gateway that have been assigned the term "Science" to the «subject» facet. Each description in the listing of resources has additional information that can be viewed by clicking on the description's "view, share, comment" button.  The "view, share, comment" button opens to the full record of each resource description and also give access to the sharing and commenting functions for each resource description.

5.  In the right-hand column you see a listing of terms in the additional facets of the descriptions in the center column. You can use this listing of facet terms to narrow the number of resources shown to include only those containing terms you select from the facet lists. You can continue selecting terms one at a time from the facet lists-each time reducing the number of resource descriptions to those that come closer and closer to meeting your needs.

6.   There are several things you should note about the facet column on the right-hand side of the screen. It consists of two parts: (1) at the very top of the column is a section that begins with the phrase "Items matching", and (2) a part beginning with the phrase "Refine by". Let's explore each section separately:

• Items matching. This section contains a list of the facets and their associated words and phrases that you have already selected in refining your set of discovered resources. Each facet and its term is preceded in the listing with a check box that looks like a box with an "x" in it ( ). You can remove, or deselect any facet and its associated term from this listing by clicking on the check box beside the name of the facet. The second aspect of this section to note is how the system tells you how many resources are in your current listing–e.g., "12 items matching."

• Refine by. This section contains a list of the facets and their associated terms that exist in your set of resources that you have yet to select and explore.

Note that as you select terms from the "Refine by" section, they appear in the "Items matching" section. If you deselect a facet and its associated term in the "Items matching" section by clicking on its check box ( ), the facet and its term are returned to the "Refine by" section and are available for selection later in your exploration if you wish.

Refining browse result by searching

At any time during the browse process, you may search within the GEM records by entering a word or a phrase in the "Search the GEM Catalog" box at the top of the facet listing, selecting the "Search in Results" radio button and clicking "Go". GEM will look for only those records that contain your word or phrase and return those records to you for further exploration.

More information: Discovery by Searching