Frequently asked questions
about
Study Guides and Strategies

Reading is to the mind
what exercise is to the body
Richard Steele, English 1672-1729

The new domain offers developers several advantages:

• Direct access to the Web site for developers across institutional/national boundaries
• Better site metrics tracking
• Continued support for FrontPage and its extensions
• Access to Java servlets and Java Server Pages for features under development
• Support for Flash for features under development
• Enhanced support for foreign language translations
• Possibilities of developing organizational partnerships and financial support

2. What new features are under development!

• Programming is near complete on an on-line, web-based learner self-assessment instrument
• A optional set of interactive exercises is under consideration for each Guide.
  We intend to preserve the direct, text-based format for the Guides, but present more engaging and dynamic exercises for most of them. These will either be developed in Java or Flash.

3. Where did the Guides come from? How were they developed?

June 1993: Preliminary database created by Bob Nelson, et al, Learning Resource Centers, Rutgers University.
February 1996: Database conversion to HTML by Joe Landsberger with the assistance of Peter Turi, Budapest, Hungary.
September 1997: conversion to, and further developmentwith, Microsoft's FrontPage.
February 1999: Dublin Core Metadata added.
March 2001: Visual Learner Project with Inspiration Software "Mapping the Guides"
Summer 2002: Each of the 525 pages/Guides in the web site are totally re-formatted! to the new look
Summer 2003: Development of the first interactive Guides
January 2004: New domain/URL adopted

A preliminary resource database of learning guides was created by Bob Nelson, et al, Learning Resource Centers, Livingston Campus, Rutgers University in June 1993. At the College Reading and Learning Association Conference in April 1995, Joe attended a presentation by Bob on his resource, and they quickly agreed that the FileMaker Pro database should be converted to HTML and a web-based format. Rutgers University agreed that year to provide the Guides free-of-charge and -copyright to Joe to reformat into HTML, and host them on a Web site. This agreement continues to this day, and the Guides are collaboratively developed across institutional and national boundaries.

4 Who develops these Guides?

Joe Landsberger, an employee of the University of St. Thomas, developed an additional 85 guides from the original data base of 50, often at the suggestion of others. The original 50 were also revised and edited to fit the new format. Joe's main interest is providing, and digesting, educational research into an understandable and accessible form to help learners help themselves. He often recognizes his own inadequacies and writes guides to help himself progress. He understands that the format is simplistic and passive, and someday hopes to develop additional materials! There are now about 135 Guides in English and about 450 translations in 25 languages.

5 How are the Guides developed?

The Guides are developed directly from educational research. Often they are digests of existing web pages reformatted with permission to the Study Guides' Web site's style. In some cases they are copies of information found elsewhere, copied with permission. In other cases they are combinations of research projects and papers. All contributions have been voluntary, and used with permission as much as possible. Translations are voluntary also, often in exchanges with educational and commercial sites. In some cases, Guides are mirrored or reproduced, even reformatted, on collaborators' servers.

The process for developing new Guides is simple: research is compiled and "dumped" into a common text. This text is printed, and then reviewed. Key words and concepts are highlighted, and then all the extraneous text deleted. The Guide is then written out of these key words and concepts into a web-friendly format. c.f. Writing for the Web

6. What is the philosophy of the design?

The Guides are intended to be straight-forward recipes on selected topics. The vocabulary and concepts have a middle school level in mind as foundation. Few image files are used. A few Guides have two versions: one designed with graphics illustrating concepts, and one without. There are no advertisements, no special effects, no flash. Nothing is added to distract from the content.

7. What restrictions apply to the web site?

All international covenants regarding copyright and intellectual property are in effect. However, permission is granted to freely copy, adapt, print, and distribute Study Guides in non-commercial educational settings that benefit learners.However, the Guides cannot be reproduced on the Internet external to the http://www.studygs.net domain. Requests for reproduction within Intranets will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

8. Why the translations?

The goal of the Guides are to help learners. With the international traffic they have been attracting, it is better to reach students of all ages in their native language. However, the goal is also to be sensitive to customs in the cultures where the language is spoken. All translations are volunteered and every attempt is made to independently verify them. Please see the page of credits!

9. Who links to the Study Guides? 12/26/02

Review of the Study Guides web site
includes data on how many web sites link to the Guides. For purposes of comparison, links to the University of St. Thomas’ web site are included. Three search engines were tested as to which link to the Study Guides web site within their respective databases:

FAST (through Hot Bot) offered (12/26/02) the most options,
including separating out internal links, searching for sites in a particular language, and by domain. Links in the following languages were not available: Amharic, Hindi, Luganda, Tamil.

Google (through Hot Bot) allows determining numbers of links,
though its search by various settings did not consistently work on the day of the trials (8/17/03)

Alta Vista allows determining links by domains (8/17/03):

10. What is the traffic on Study Guides?

The Study Guides and Strategies web site had over 4.092 million hits for all pages in the academic year 2002-03, and has grown exponentially since counting began in 1997. The large increase in the current year may be due to a new automated system (Web Trends) adopted to track usage. Here are the past six years' data:

to be continued...

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Website overview: Since 1996 the Study Guides and Strategies web site has been researched, authored, maintained and supported by Joe Landsberger as an international, learner-centric, educational public service. Permission is granted to freely copy, adapt, and distribute individual Study Guides in print format in non-commercial educational settings that benefit learners. Please be aware that the Guides welcome, and are under, continuous review and revision. For that reason, reproduction of all content on the Internet can only be with permission through a licensed agreement. No request to link to the Web site is necessary.

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