I was sitting in my office the other day and a student knocked on my door. She came in and I thought she was going to say she had an issue with her Chromebook. That seems to be what we deal with the majority of the time now that we have moved towards 1 to 1 Chromebooks for the students.
Oddly enough, the student had a question about something other than her Chromebook. She was doing something for a dual enrollment course and she needed to know how to find the "depth" of an image.
I was a bit confused myself as I have never heard that term used in conjunction with height and width of an image. I thought maybe it was talking about "color depth", but I couldn't really be sure.
So I did what any self respecting tech professional would do...
I Googled it.
Sure enough, I was able to find the information that we think she needed and she left a happy camper.
After she left, I found myself going back to a thought that has been kicking around in my head for quite some time now.
It's not about how much you know, it's about how well you can Google.
Ain't that the truth?
I like to consider my self a pretty eclectic person. I like to say I know a little bit about a lot of things. Others might say "Jack of all trades, master of none". The fact is though, I would know even less about a lot of things if I didn't have Google or by default the Internet to fall back on.
I actually used to get a little embarrassed when I would need to Google the solution to a problem in front of someone who I was helping. It doesn't but me as much anymore.
I have found over the years that there is a huge difference between
"knowing how to Google something" and
"Knowing how to Google something"
If you get my drift.
One of the first questions people ask me when they need something fixed is "did you try turning it off and back on?".
It literally drives them crazy that I would suggest something so simple, but you know what... 9 times out of 10, that really does fix the problem. You would be amazed. Keep that one in your pocket. Call it a life lesson from good ole @bozz.
Probably my second favorite question I ask people now is:
"Did you try Googling it?"
Which honestly could probably be considered more patronizing than the first question, because like I said, there is a difference between knowing how to Google something and really knowing how to Google something.
I've found over the years that being able to string together the right words in the right way is somewhat of an art form that can make or break your search results.
Not to toot my own horn, but I feel I have become pretty darn good at it over the years. @mrsbozz is one smart cookie, she has picked up quite a few tech skill being married to this "tech guy", but even she runs into a brick wall when she is Googling an answer.
Inevitably, she will ask for help and more often than not I will find that magic combination of phrases or words that yields the solution.
Just this morning we ran into a bit of an issue setting up some technology for a professional development the teachers are sitting through.
I was able to find the solution on Google and after the fact I kind of had to smile to myself when my worker asked:
"What did you type in to figure that out?"
I had literally already started writing this post. Talk about serendipity!
Keepers of Knowledge
Back in the day, some of you might remember before the Internet, we didn't have the world at our fingertips. If you wanted information on something you had to go to the library or school. You had to find the encyclopedia or hit the card catalog and find a specific book about that topic.
That isn't the case these days, but it doesn't mean the knowledge is easy to find. More accessible yes, but easy to find... only if you know the best way to Google it!
Trust me, my brain is far from spectacular, but there is definitely some weird boolean wiring going on that makes me able to Google so effectively. Maybe I am just lucky. That's probably more likely!
Perhaps it is just years of experience. I was raised on Yahoo, Webcrawler, AtlaVista, Dogpile, Ask Jeeves, Netscape, and Excite. I've had literally decades to hone my web searching skills. Back then things were even harder to find than they are today. This was before cataloged YouTube videos and all of that.
Have you noticed this phenomenon? Do you consider yourself to be a "master searcher"? Do Google queries dance through your dreams and flow from your fingertips like liquid gold?
I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments!
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