1. Hey there! Have you evaluated? Is that site good enough to cite ?
2. Hmmm. This one looks good. How can I tell for sure?
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4. Remember: Anyone can publish anything on the Web! It is your job, as a researcher, to look for quality!
5. Okay, so how do we know if a site is good? Yeah, and how can we be sure our teacher will think it’s good enough to cite?
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8. But what if I can’t find any author information?
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16. (Include here links to sites with bias. Preferably present more than one point of view.) Multnomah County Library’s Social Issues page offers links to sites on all sides of major issues: http://www.multcolib.org/homework/sochc.html Considering Bias
What are the various reasons people choose to publish on the Web? How is Web publishing different from traditional print--book, magazine, newspaper--publishing? Who filtered (or selected) those resources for quality?
In the old days, we had good old print to rely on. Books and magazines still go through a filtering process for quality. Before they are published, they are double-checked by authors and edited for accuracy by a variety of professionals. This is nOT the case with material on the free Web.
You discover an author has a Ph.D. Do you need to investigate any further? What if her degree is in physics and the site she wrote is on Shakespeare? Is everything on Geocities bad? Would your teacher question you citing a source that resided on a free server?
Very often it is difficult to find information about authorship. That may be a clue in itself. However, if you really want to use a page, do not give up! You may have to dig a little deeper to establish a page’s authority!
Clues often appear on the top or bottom of a page, or in menu bars and frames. These sections often contain authorship clues!
Do a link check here for a reliable site. Have your students examine and evaluate the URLs of the sites that linked to the site in question.
Spelling and grammatical errors are important clues that a site ought to be avoided as a source. Be on the lookout for information that just doesn’t “feel right.”
These hoax sites work well for making the point about accuracy!
Select a few links with strong points of view to demonstrate bias. Around election time these sites are even more bountiful!
Research is not a contest. It doesn’t matter how many sources you collect. What does matter is their quality and their relevance!
Can you give examples of when it would be more or less important to have your site be current? Is it important that an author keep a site maintained?
Be very suspicious of information that appears out of nowhere. Unless this is a completely original source some documentation ought to be present for you to take the page seriously.
