Searching the ATE Central Resource Collection—What You Need to Know

Each year, the ATE community produces hundreds or even thousands of new resources. These can range from lesson plans to videos to professional development materials, and more. Information about these resources can be found in the ATE Central resource collection, where items have been cataloged using standardized metadata to make it easy to find whatever you're looking for.

Keyword Search
For a quick keyword search, simply enter a search term into the keyword search bar in the upper right corner of the ATE Central homepage. This form of searching is most useful when you want an overview of the resources that include particular keywords, and is often a great starting point for a search that can then be narrowed to focus on the most useful results. In addition to relevant resources, search results can include related projects and centers, upcoming events, ATE@20 blog posts, and other content on the ATE Central site.

Advanced Search
The advanced search option is ideal for conducting more complex searches. For example, if you're interested in finding out what kinds of materials the ATE community has produced for high school biology education, you can enter “biology” as a keyword search term and then limit your search by Education Level. This requires some forethought and extra effort, but may find resources specific to your needs more quickly than a keyword search. There are two ways to get to the Advanced Search page. For those with an ATE Central account, simply log in and you will see the Advanced Search option in the upper right under the search box. Otherwise, selecting “refine search” after conducting a keyword search will pull up the page. As with most search engines, some simple tips and tricks can help you optimize your search to maximize its effectiveness. Check out the bottom of the Advanced Search page for a helpful guide.

Faceted Search
If you would like to narrow your search results even further, faceted search can be a useful tool. After conducting a keyword search, facets (on the left-hand side of the results page) can be used to refine your search further. For example, once you have search results for high school biology education, you can further narrow them by resource type, language, or a handful of other attributes.

Browsing
If you're not looking for a particular item or keyword, but are interested instead in a category of resources or in getting an understanding of the topics covered in ATE Central, you may wish to take advantage of the site’s resource browsing options. From this page, you can use different classifications to browse the collection: ATE Area (Biotechnology, Manufacturing, Engineering, etc.), Education Level (Elementary School High School, Higher Education, etc.), Format (Application, Archive, Document, Video, etc.), GEM Subject (Educational Technology, Health, Science, etc.), and Resource Type (Assessment Material, Dataset, Instructional Material, Professional Development, etc.).

Whether you're interested in expanding your understanding of a specific topic, finding curriculum to use, or merely exploring the breadth and depth of ATE project and center deliverables, smart use of the browse and search functions on ATE Central can help you accomplish your goal.