Debate Preparation

During our study of insurance, we had a rather heated class discussion concerning health insurance. While all agreed it is important to have health insurance, there was lots of class discussion on who should pay for this type of insurance.

In this activity, we will research the cost of health insurance. You must form an opinion about how health care coverage should be financed. Be able to support your opinion with facts from your research. We will have a class debate in a few days.

Create a one page academic report based on your research. Use parenthetical references to site your sources.

Search Tips

You may use any search engine you choose to locate this information on the Internet. Here are some tips on how to search efficiently.

Tip	Purpose	Guide
Use multiple keywords in your search that are descriptive of and specific to your search topic.	This helps to narrow your search. The results may contain these words scattered anywhere in the text.	You are searching for statistics about George Mason’s women’s basketball program. Enter: George Mason women basketball statistics Not: Basketball Not: George Mason Basketball
Use + and – to include and exclude words from your search. (Some search engines assume the + sign in their searches)	Adding or removing a word often associated with the topic will narrow your search results. Again, words may be scattered throughout the results.	Enter: +Shakespeare –plays +life and times This will find information about the life and times of Shakespeare, not his plays. Not: Shakespeare life and times This will find information about his plays as well. Key with no space between the + or – and the word but with a space between words.
Use a wildcard (*) delimiter. The asterisk (*) represents any character. Preferred way to search for plurals rather than adding an “s” on the end of the word.	Allows you to search for derivations of the original search word. This will avoid narrowing your search too much by not excluding variations on a word.	Enter: teach* This will return teach, teacher, teaching, teaches, etc. Not: teach Which will return just topics with the word teach in the text.
Use the Boolean operators (And, Or, Not) In some search engines this must be done through an advanced search.	And—used when all of several words must be present. Or—used when one or the other word will give similar results. Not—certain word will be excluded from the search.	Enter: Washington AND Jefferson Will include sites with both Washington and Jefferson. Enter: Washington OR Jefferson Will include those sites with either Washington or Jefferson. Enter: Washington NOT Jefferson Will return entries that have Washington but not Jefferson.
Put important words or phrases in quotes	Useful if you are looking for an exact phrase—if these words are commonly found together. Phrases not in quotes may find words scattered throughout the text.	Enter: “boy scout Sunday” which will find information on that particular date. Not: boy scout Sunday, which will also find information of boy scouts in general with the word Sunday in the article.
Use link: feature to find related pages that contain the same information as the current site.	Useful when you have found a great site. Other web sites may have links to this site and are probably worth looking at. This is an easy way to find them.	Enter: Link: (good web address) This will find pages that contain a link to the original page you found. You suspect that these pages may also be of interest. May also place only part of the web address after the word link.
Look for sites that have the keyword in the title.	A simple search will find that keyword anywhere on the web page. To find specific information abut this topic, specify a search for a title containing that keyword.	Enter: Title: little bighorn battle Will return those sites with a title of Little Bighorn Battle. General keyword search for Little bighorn battle may have the words mentioned anywhere in the site as separate occurrences. For example—battle over bighorn sheep have received little attention lately.

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