Top 20 Safe Search Engines

No site is really 100% safe even when dealing w/ filtered search engines, but keeping that in mind these are a good place to start in dealing w/ students or searching from home...

*This list is in alphabetical order.

Top 20 Safe Search Engines

1. Choosito - A very popular safe way to search the web as well as library resources.
2. Classhook - A wonderful site for students to find educational videos through TV shows and movies.
3. Cybersleuth Kids - A older search engine that is great for finding educational games, activities, clip art, and more.
4. DinoSearch - A nice safe search engine for kids that uses three different filters to block inappropriate search results.
5. DOGOnews - DOGOnews is an excellent site for finding Reading material/assignments for grades K-8 that can then be integrated into Google Classroom.  This is done through their curated safe (COPA compliant) educational database/search engine that provides assessment and language/speech features.
6. Famhoo - A family friendly search engine that filters all content.
7. Google (safe search) - Google has a nice safe search setting which can be locked into place at the browser level for those that use Firefox.
8. History Engine - An amazing way for students to search through different events throughout history.
9. Kiddle - One of the most popular safe visual search engines for kids.
10. Kidtopia - A nice safe COPPA/CIPA compliant search engine for kids/students.
11. Kid Rex - Is a wonderful search engine designed around Google's safe search. Also, it has a very nice visual appeal for kids.
12. Lesson Planet - A great search engine for teachers looking for lessons and other resources that they can share w/ their students.
13. Lumos Edsearch - A excellent site for for finding educational resources, videos, apps, and more.
14. Nettrekker - A great paid site for searching the web not only for students but for teachers as well.
15. Photos for Class - The easiest way to find safe Creative Common licensed photos for the classroom and home that are cited appropriately.
16. Refseek - A wonderful academic search engine that indexes through documents, encyclopedias,  web pages, and books.
17. Springo Kids - A fun visual search engine for kids where results are given in thumbnails.
18. Sweet Search - A group of experts (that includes librarians & teachers) evaluate all content from this search engine.
19. Symbolab - A innovative scientific search engine that is great for solving Math and Science problems.
20. Top Marks - A great site developed in the UK by teachers who approved everything on this site.

Squify

Squify is a new search engine that was just released today.  This is a unique engine that show page results n a 3D wheel.  A user can turn the wheel to get to the page they want.  It has a nice visual and helps to be able to see the page before clicking on it.  However, I recommend using caution if you are going to use this in a school setting as there is no built in filter.

Check out Squify by clicking here!!!

For my Pinterest board on Search Engines click here.

Search Engines - Pinterest

I have a created a board on Pinterest for search engines.  This is a work in progress as I had lots of sites to go through.  This will include a wide gambit of different content such as: video, clip art, images (I'll do a separate board for them), lesson plans, kid friendly).

I recommend checking out my board for search engines by clicking here.

Hitsplitter

Recently, I received an email promoting a new kind of search engine called Hitsplitter. After giving it a try, I decided to post verbatim about this interesting site.

Hitsplitter is a tool for comparative search, based on Google.

With Hitsplitter, you can find where people write about brands, products, persons or any keyword.
The tool scans sets of websites like the Top 50 US blogs or the top 20 Wikipedia domains. User can also define their own sets of sites to scan.

Economists can use Hitsplitter.com to see where people around the world write about inflation. Linguists can use Hitsplitter to see which newspapers write ‘insurgents’ and which prefer ‘terrorists’.
Journalists can use Hitsplitter to see who writes about the iPhone.

The free tool runs up to 250 searches simultaneously, for example to compare 10 keywords across 25 websites.

In 2011, Hitsplitter will offer a subscription service that offers more searches and automated monitoring.

Give Hitsplitter a try by clicking here!!

Below is a demo video of Hitsplitter in action...

Top 10 Safe Search Engines

The other day upon reading my email I received one from an educational list serv requesting safe search engines for students. After thinking about it and already just doing a list on Top 10 Search Engines other then Google, I was able to come up w/ a number of them that meet this very need.

However, keep in mind when dealing w/ students and surfing the internet it's important to remember that no site is really 100% safe even when dealing w/ filtered search engines. Although, when choosing to use search engines w/ students I would definitely recommend starting w/ the following sites below...

Top 10 Safe Search Engines

1. Sweet Search - A group of experts (that includes librarians & teachers) evaluate all content from this search engine.
   
2. Top Marks - A great site developed in the UK by teachers who approved everything on this site.
   
3. Quintura for Kids - An innovative search engine for kids that displays results in a cloud based style. Also, has apps for mobile devices.
   
4. Kid Rex - Is a wonderful search engine designed around Google's safe search. Also, it has a very nice visual appeal for kids.
   
5. Ask Kids - A search engine designed for kids ages 6-12.
   
6. Yahoo Kids - Previously known as Yahooligans, Yahoo Kids is a fun site for kids to gather information on the internet.
   
7. Famhoo - A family friendly search engine that filters all content.
   
8. One Key - Developed in 1996, One Key in collaboration w/ Google does a nice job of creating a safe search engine.
   
9. Google (safe search) - Google has a nice safe search setting which can be locked into place at the browser level for those that use Firefox.
   
10. Nettrekker - A great paid site for searching the web not only for students but for teachers as well.
    

Kosmix

Kosmix is an interesting search engine that focuses on finding the best in social media content. After doing a search on Web 2.0 and Technology Integration, I must admit the results were rather satisfying as it displays it's content in a nice visual snapshot.

I recommend giving Kosmix a try by clicking here!!

Google Swirl

Google Swirl is a site I just found out about from one of my favorite blogs, Free Technology 4 Teachers. This is a new way (developed in Google Labs ;-) to search for images.

What I like so much about it is that after you type in a term, it gives you a list of thumbnails on top of stacks. It vaguely reminded me of how Time Machine looks when you are restoring a backup on a Mac. Once a thumbnail is clicked the real fun begins as a "wonder wheel" opens up (think Richard Pryor in the Toy). However, the image can be clicked even further to show how everything is linked together in a nice display of wheels.



Give Google Swirl a try by clicking here.

Twurdy

Twurdy is a new (beta) search engine which I first read about on Larry Ferlazzo's excellent blog. After giving it a try it kind of reminded me a cross between Nettrekker and Google because it gives you results based on read ability levels. Any user of Nettrekker will be very familiar w/ how this is done.

Below is an example of results based on the term, semantic web.



Give Twurdy a try by clicking here.