Ask Jeeves

http://www.ask.com/ , http://www.ajkids.com/

If you haven't discovered Ask Jeeves yet, you've really been missing out! Ask Jeeves is a "natural language" search engine, which makes it less precise, but easy for kids to use. Ask Jeeves Kids also offers a variety of instantly-clickable resources, including kids-safe clip art and references.

KidsClick

http://kidsclick.org/

Kidsclick is a managed database (a project of the Ramapo Catskill Library System), which means the sites it contains are pre-loaded and managed by people - in this case, librarians - rather than an automated keyword-search process, like the bigger engines. Hence the "hits" will be low in number, but there won't be any surprises. Covers K-7. The sites are rated by grade level appropriateness. There are even links to lesson plans!

Yahooligans

http://www.yahooligans.com/

A decided improvement over Yahoo (see below), Yahooligans is also a directly-managed database of sites. There's distracting fun stuff and ads which make it less attractive than some, but it's generally a good kids-safe environment.

Here's a short list of popular kid's search engines that we didn't like quite as well.

• OneKey (http://www.onekey.com/) - This veteran site for kid-safe searching is now a simple portal for Google's SafeSearch (see below) - you might as well go to the source. 
• Lycozone (http://lycoszone.lycos.com/) - edgy, clever, and buried in ads - aimed at the "kid's market" rather than the educational needs of students.