SMILE Guidelines

Tips on how to use the Guidelines

• All metadata fields in the NCS (the SMILE cataloging tool) have a link to the Guidelines, which gives the cataloger more information about what to enter in that field.
• Some fields also have brief instructions or clarifications on the data entry page itself, i.e., for the url field, you’ll see “Enter the URL for the page that will be most useful to an educator for this resource.” For further information on the url field, you would click on Guidelines, in blue and just under the field name.
• Let us know if you have questions about any of the Guidelines, and please share good examples we should include here.  Email Lauren (llindskog<at>exploratorium.edu) with your questions/suggestions.
  

Definition

The metadata record number of the resource, which is automatically generated when a submitter enters a resource.

Guidelines

• You don’t need to enter anything into the recordID field.

Definition

A web-based address (URL) that points to the most useful page of a single learning activity or resource. URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator.

Guidelines

• The URL should point to the most useful page for a particular activity, even if it is part of a bigger learning resource

• Another field, relatedUrls, allows both higher-level URLs for a larger collection the resource might come from (”Is part of”), as well as any lower-level URLs for component pieces that are related to this particular activity (”Has part”).

• Note: It is possible for multiple SMILE records to have the same URL, for example a document with many activities cataloged separately to make them easier to find.
• Enter the full web address, including http://

Examples

1. For the ‘Dinosaur’ Bone Experiments, the most useful URL is the PDF version of the instructions. It would be challenging to give instructions on how to navigate through the larger Big Dinos Return site to the experiments. This can be noted in the description if it’s important:

• title — ‘Dinosaur’ Bone Experiments
• URL — http://www.lhs.berkeley.edu/bigdinos/dino_ex1.pdf [downloadable instructions most useful]
• relatedUrls –
  • Is part of — Big Dinos Return, http://www.lhs.berkeley.edu/bigdinos [larger resource]
• description — “These instructions are also available by navigating through the Big Dinos Return site.”

2. For the activity Size Wheel, where students build a paper wheel from three separate printouts, from the Nanozone collection:

• title — Size Wheel
• URL — http://nanozone.org/sizewheel.htm [overall instruction page most useful]
• relatedUrls –
  • Is part of — Nanozone http://nanozone.org [larger resource]
  • Has part — Size Wheel printout http://nanozone.org/sizewheel.pdf
  • Has part — Size Wheel printout http://nanozone.org/sizewheel_cover.pdf
  • Has part — Stickers printout http://nanozone.org/stickers.pdf

3. The activity Pom-Pom Toss is in both English and Spanish. Therefore the most useful URL is the Math At Home PDF, which includes both versions on pages 7 and 8. This can be included in the description:

• title — Pom-Pom Toss / Lazando las pom-pom
• URL — http://www.cmhouston.org/attachments/contentmanagers/787/MathatHome06.pdf
• relatedUrls
  • Is part of — Math at Home http://www.cmhouston.org/en/cms/?787 [larger resource]
• description — “This activity appears in English on page 7 and in Spanish on page 8 of the PDF.”

Definition

The name of the resource, or (if it doesn’t have an explicit title) a phrase that describes the resource (like a caption).

Guidelines and Examples

General

• A title is required for each record. If no title is specified for the resource, create one that is descriptive and unique, keeping resource discovery in mind.

• If there is a subtitle specified you can enter it separately.
  • title — Salt Volcano
  • subtitle — Make a “Lava Lite”

• Keep it short–aim for a total word count of fewer than ten words (or fewer than 55 characters, including spaces) for the title and subtitle together. Example of an excessively long title/subtitle mix: “Around the Town: Use maps to compare the distance to different places around town.” That title/subtitle could be effectively edited down to: “Around the Town: Use Maps to Compare Distances”
• If you enter a title and a subtitle, a colon is automatically inserted after the title when the entire title displays: Salt Volcano: Make a “Lava Light”
• If the original title (for example, “Hit the Spot”) does not give much of an idea of what the activity is about, you might want to compose a concise subtitle that is more descriptive (in this case, “Physics and Your Tennis Racquet”)
• It is not necessary to add the origin of the activity to the title since that information can be included in the sourceInstitution and/or resourceAuthors fields.
  • title — Exploratorium AfterSchool Jitterbug
  • sourceInstitution — The Exploratorium
  • resourceAuthors –  organization
    • insitutionName — Exploratorium
    • institutionDepartment — AfterSchool Resources

• To prevent inadvertently copying bad characters into a cataloging tool, paste text that has been copied from a web site or other document into a text only document in an application such as Notepad. Be aware of bad characters in the title statement (ampersand &, asterisk *, quotation mark “, etc.).

Resources in more than one language

There are two options:

1. Create a single metadata record, mostly in English, with the multiple languges chosen in the resourceLanguages and English in the metadataLanguage fields. In this case, write the title in both languages separated by a forward slash, and do the same for any subtitle.

• title — Caterpillar Measure / Medida de Oruga
• resourceLanguages — English, Spanish
• metadataLanguage — English

2. Create multiple metadata records, each in a completely different language as chosen in the metadataLanguage field.

• title — Caterpillar Measure
• resourceLanguages — English
• metadataLanguage — English

• title — Medida de Oruga
• resourceLanguages — Spanish
• metadataLanguage — Spanish

Capitals and Punctuation

• Capitalize all words in the title except articles (e.g. “a,” “an,” “the”) and prepositions (e.g. “above,” “before,” “for,” “in”), unless those parts of speech come at the beginning of the sentence.
  • title — Salt Volcano
  • title — Eat Like a Bird
  • title — Canine House of Cards

• Do not use all capital letters, i.e. SALT VOLCANO
• Keep ending punctuation in the title statement (BUT no periods).
  • title — Riddle Me This!
  • title — Fold It and Fly It!
  • title — What Is Static Electricity?

• Apostrophes are allowed in the title and subtitle.
  • title — ‘Dinosaur’ Bone Experiments

Too Generic

• If the resource title is too generic (e.g. Lesson plans, Teacher resources, Career pathway) construct a title using words that are descriptive yet concise, and that accurately describe the content of the resource. Choose descriptive words from captions, headings, and the introductory paragraph when helpful.

Acronyms

• Use acronyms sparingly in the title. Spell out abbreviations in the title if the meaning is unclear or the title does not make sense without further clarification.
  • Science Education Gateway (SEGway)

• Common acronyms are okay
  • NASA [instead of National Aeronautics and Space Administration]

Extraneous words

• Omit the use of extraneous words at the beginning of the title.
  • title — Welcome to the…
  • title — NASA presents…
  • title — Unit…
  • title — Chapter…
  • title — Section…

Definition

Optional field that can provide more information about the activity. The subtitle may already be part of the activity or the cataloger may choose to compose one.

Examples and Best Practices

• If the activity title is “Fold it and Fly it!” the cataloger may want to add a subtitle that will give educators a better sense of the activity, such as “Paper Airplanes on the Assembly Line.”
• In the case of an activity titled “Bighorn Adventure,” the cataloger created a subtitle that gave more information: “Field Trip in Canyonlands National Park, Utah
• Try to keep the subtitle under 50 characters, including spaces and punctuation.
• Capitalization is the same for the subtitle as for the title.  Capitalize all words in the subtitle except articles (e.g. “a,” “an,” “the”) and prepositions (e.g. “above,” “before,” “for,” “in”), unless those parts of speech come at the beginning of the subtitle.

Definition

The relatedUrls field allows you to identify the components of the resource (”Has part”), and a larger resource this one might come from (”Is part of”).  These are important fields to catalog.

Guidelines

• The idea is that when a SMILE record is called up in a search, that record will also contain two additional types of links:
  • “Has part”: The various components that make up the resource (PDFs, lesson plans, etc.).
  • “Is part of”: The larger collection this resource comes from.

• A title is not required for a relatedUrl, but if a title is omitted, the link will appear as the full url, which gives the searcher considerably less information than a title would.

• You can also add additional notes in the description field to clarify what these links represent.

To choose relatedUrls:

1. Click “addRelatedUrl”
2. Choose a kind from the drop-down menu, either “Has part” for components of the resource, or “Is part of” for a larger collection.
3. Enter a title and a url. If there is no title specified for a given url, consider making one up based on what is at that link (optional).
4. Choose an option from the fileType drop-down menu. If the url entered in the url field is a web page, for instance (ending in ‘html’) then choose ‘web page’ from the drop-down menu. Note that if the url extension (doc, html, etc,) doesn’t match the fileType, the page will not display in SMILE.
   

Components (”Has part”)

• These are the resources that are “one level down” from the main URL you chose. These items are what educators will use in preparing for and carrying out the activity itself.

• Do NOT link to pages that align the resource to standards, or to assessments included. Instead, enter those URLs directly in other separate fields, standardsUrl and assessmentUrl.

• You can include links to “Going Further” type pages, but don’t include direct links to these supplemental materials or related references that aren’t used directly by the resource.
  

Larger Resource (”Is part of”)

• These are the resources that are “one level up” from the main URL. These might be collections of activities a museum has for a particular topic, or resources that all come from the same book that has been put online.

• In general, don’t link to an entire museum or organization. This is NOT the place to express the top-level collection that a resource may be a part of, such as the Exploratorium, or Lawrence Hall of Science. Those can be expressed in the sourceInstitution field (under the Authorship, Rights tab).

Example

1. The Exploratorium’s Jitterbug activity is part of their AfterSchool activities collection, and also has several component parts such as videos, PDFs, and other Web pages. It might be cataloged like this:

• title — Jitterbug
• URL — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/index.php [most useful page shows the educator, at a glance, all the various components of the activity]
• relatedURLs — Is part of
  • title — AfterSchool activities [larger collection]
  • url — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/
• relatedURLs — Has part
  • title — Introduction
  • url – http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/index.php?activity=136&program=577
• relatedURLs — Has part
  • title — Step-by-Step Demonstration
  • url — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/index.php?activity=136&program=578
• relatedURLs — Has part
  • title — What’s Going On
  • url — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/index.php?activity=136&program=579
• relatedURLs — Has part
  • title — Going Further
  • url — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/index.php?activity=136&display=further
• relatedURLs — is part of
  • title — Concept Map
  • url — http://www.exploratorium.edu/afterschool/activities/docs/jitterbug_map.pdf

More Condensed Examples

1. title — ‘Dinosaur’ Bone Experiments

• URL –  http://www.lhs.berkeley.edu/bigdinos/dino_ex1.pdf [most useful downloadable instructions]
• relatedUrls
  • Is part of — Big Dinos Return,  http://www.lhs.berkeley.edu/bigdinos

2. title — Size Wheel

• URL –  http://nanozone.org/sizewheel.htm [most useful instruction page]
• relatedUrls –
  • Is part of — Nanozone,  http://nanozone.org
  • Has part — Size Wheel printout,  http://nanozone.org/sizewheel.pdf
  • Has part — Size Wheel printout,  http://nanozone.org/sizewheel_cover.pdf
  • Has part — Stickers printout,  http://nanozone.org/stickers.pdf

3. title — Pom-Pom Toss / Lazando las pom-pom

• URL — http://www.cmhouston.org/attachments/contentmanagers/787/MathatHome06.pdf [since it's in both English and Spanish, the most useful URL is the Math At Home PDF which includes both versions on pages 7 and 8]
• relatedUrls
  • isPartOf — Math at Home,  http://www.cmhouston.org/en/cms/?787

Definition

A brief (50-125 words) but comprehensive explanation of the resource. The description aims to help users determine if the resource is something to investigate further.

Guidelines

• Here is a general format to consider using:
  • This is an (experiment, lesson plan for a game, activity…) about (concept, topic, event…).
  • Learners will… (do stuff).
  • Something cool is… (something you think is worth pointing out).
  • Ideas for use include…
  • Other important, useful, worthwhile information is…

• Pay particular attention to the first line, as this is what will show up in many search results pages. That first line should have the most pertinent and basic information, with more details coming later in the description.

• Think like a user who finds this description while searching — what do you really need to know?

• Avoid using technical words that are beyond the level of what the resource itself uses. Save those words to use as keywords.

• Keep it brief.

• State what the resource offers. Describe what’s unique, interesting, and useful about the resource but avoid overblown “marketing” language — be non-judgmental.

• Use complete sentences.

• Spell out all acronyms when they are initially used. Either write the acronym and then its meaning in parentheses, or write out all the words and then the acronym in parentheses.
  • FOSS (Full Option Science System)
  • Coalition for Science After School (CSAS)

• Because the description is searchable, incorporate key terms and concepts that can facilitate resource discovery.

• Avoid over-summarizing the activity instructions or the phenomenon represented.   Instead, provide an introduction or “blurb” about the activities use.

Examples

1. For The Exploratorium’s Salt Volcano: Make your own miniature “Lava Lite”:

• description — This activity is to build a model of a Lava Lite (or Lava Lamp) using materials you might find on a restaurant table. It demonstrates first how oil floats on water, sinks when you add salt to it, then floats again as the salt dissolves into the water. This can be a model for the sinking and floating of “lava” in a Lava Lite. Both are based on changes in density, but in the Lava Lite it’s a light bulb’s heat, not salt, that is causing the “lava” to rise and fall.

• keywords — lava lamp, chemistry, density, sinking, floating, immiscible, dissolving, lava lite, toy

2. For the “Build-A-Fish” activity, <http://sv.berkeley.edu/showcase/flash/fish.html>:

• description — In this interactive Flash simulation learners choose an ocean environment, and then “build a fish” with body features that will help it survive there. It is easy to make changes and check the “survive-o-meter.” Each environment also includes an example of “Who Lives Here?” showing a well-adapted fish. This interactive is based on an activity in “Kelp Forest,” a curriculum by MARE (Marine Activities, Resources & Education).

• keywords — fish, environment, survival, evolution, adaptation, ocean, environment

Definition

The terms, phrases, or categories that best describe the topics or content of the resource.

Guidelines

• You may choose as many terms as you like, but make sure the connection between resource and subject category is evident and will help educators find appropriate activities.

• Note: Look first for the most specific subject category; when you choose that category, the categories one and two levels up will automatically be associated with the resource.

Examples

1. From Salt Volcano: Make your own miniature “Lava Lite”

• description — This activity is to build a model of a Lava Lite (or Lava Lamp) using materials you might find on a restaurant table. It demonstrates first how oil floats on water, sinks when you add salt to it, then floats again as the salt dissolves into the water. This can be a model for the sinking and floating of “lava” in a Lava Lite. Both are based on changes in density, but in the Lava Lite it’s a light bulb’s heat, not salt, that is causing the “lava” to rise and fall.

• subjects — Physical Sciences : Heat and Thermodynamics : Heat Transfer [for how the Lava Lite works]
• subjects — Physical Sciences : Interactions of Matter [automatically included with selection of the sub-category Solutions]
• subjects — Physical Sciences : Interactions of Matter : Solutions [salt dissolves]
• subjects — Physical Sciences : Motion and Forces : Gravity [for sinking]
• subjects — Physical Sciences : States of Matter : Liquids [oil and water]
• subjects — Physical Sciences : Structure and Properties of Matter : Volume and Density [for sinking and floating]

Definition

These designations are more akin to hobby types than to the more academic disciplines represented in the subjects field.

Guidelines

• Choose as many informalCategories as is appropriate.

• Try not to stretch much beyond the informalCategories suggested by the resource, even if you have ideas for how it could be used in seemingly unrelated ways. Save such ideas for comments on the resource.

Choices

Here are the choices for informalCategories:

• Animals: includes pets
• Arts and Crafts: simple materials, but also includes trade crafts like glasswork and blacksmithing
• Outdoor Activity: activity that is specifically designed for the outdoors
• Collecting
• Computers: about computers, not used for activities that are simply performed on a computer
  
• Crime Science: has to do with forensics
• Electronics
• Financial Literacy: teaches something about finance or accounting
• Food and Cooking
• Games
• Gardening: only for activities that refer specifically to gardening
• Historical Reenactment
• Literature
• Model Building:  vehicles, buildings
• Music
• Nature and Environment:  nature activities, done inside or outside
• Performing Arts
• Photography and Film/Video
• Physical Activity – requires learners to move their bodies in some physical capacity including walking, running, jumping, etc.
• Sports and Exercise
• Toys
• Transportation

Examples

1. From Salt Volcano: Make your own miniature “Lava Lite”

• informalCategories — Toys [the Lava Lite]

2. From Breaking the Mayan Code: Mayan Math

• informalCategories — Historical Reenactment [as students learn ancient math]

3. From Habitats of the Pond

• informalCategories — Outdoor Activity [designed to be done outdoors], Animals [includes identifying pond animals], Nature and Environment [nature education activity]

Definition

Single terms or short phrases that best define the main points of your topic. Try to include at least five (5) keywords or phrases for each resource.

Guidelines

• Enter all words and phrases into a single window, separating them with commas. Click the “done” button.  Each word or phrase will then be shown in its own window, for ease of editing or deletion.

• Think of the terms you yourself might use to search for the resource; these will most likely be excellent keywords for SMILE metadata.

• It’s ok to repeat keywords from the title and description fields, since our search engine will treat the fields separately.

• Try you can also include words related to the subjects you choose for the resource.

• Include technical terms that might be too advanced to include in the description, since the description should reflect the content of the resource.

• You don’t have to repeat words that have the same basic root, like “immiscible” and “immiscibility,” since our search engine will take care of making it “immisc” to include all such cases.

• Capitalize keywords that are proper nouns, such as Fahrenheit, Celsius, or Einstein.

Examples

1. Lawrence Hall of Science’s Build a Fish:

• keywords –fish, environment, survival, evolution, adaptation, ocean environment

• description — In this interactive Flash simulation you choose an ocean environment, and then “build a fish” with body features that will help it survive there. There are six environments, and the mouth, body, tail, and shading options are the same in each environment. It is easy to make changes and check the “survive-o-meter,” and the more suitable the feature is the more fins appear for that feature. Each environment also includes and example of “Who Lives Here?” showing a well-adapted fish.

2. The Exploratorium’s Salt Volcano: Make your own miniature “Lava Lite”:

• keywords — lava lamp, chemistry, density, sinking, floating, immiscible, dissolving, lava lite, toy

• description — This activity is to build a model of a Lava Lite (or Lava Lamp) using materials you might find on a restaurant table. It demonstrates first how oil floats on water, sinks when you add salt to it, then floats again as the salt dissolves into the water. This can be a model for the sinking and floating of “lava” in a Lava Lite. Both are based on changes in density, but in the Lava Lite it’s a light bulb’s heat, not salt, that is causing the “lava” to rise and fall.