Finding And Evaluating Websites

FINDING AND EVALUATING WEBSITES

CRITERIA FOR EVALUATING A WEBSITE
Authority
Currency
Accuracy
Objectivity
Content

AUTHORITY
Is the author stated?
Does he/she have the necessary education or experience on the subject?
Is the page part of an individual's site or part of an organization's site?
Who is the sponsor? How reputable is the sponsor?
Is contact information available for the author or the sponsor?

ACCURACY
Is the site free of obvious errors?
Are the facts valid compared to other reliable sources?
Does the author give proper attribution to borrowed information or knowledge?

OBJECTIVITY
Does the author have a bias, taking a position on an issue, or giving only one side of the story?
Is the site designed to promote or sell a service or product?
What's the purpose of the site? To what audience is the author writing?

CURRENCY
Does the web page show when it was last updated?
Is the information up-to-date?
How current are the links? Have some expired or moved?

CONTENT
Does the site offer something unique that is not found elsewhere?
Is the subject well-researched and covered comprehensively?
Is the information well organized?

GOOGLE
We know our students are using it but we can show them how to be better users of it.
Advanced Google searching techniques

ALTERNATIVES TO GOOGLE
There are many search engines that we can show our students and even require that they use for an assignment

GOOGLE SCHOLAR
A scholarly version of Google, finds primarily journal literature as well as
Theses/dissertations
Books from scholarly publishers
Preprint databases

GOOGLE BOOKS
3 categories of books
In print and in copyright-preview & purchase options (links to Amazon, Borders, etc)
Out of print but in copyright- available online for preview and purchase.
Out of copyright-can read, download and print

DIRECTORIES/INDICES
Yahoo directory
Librarian’s Index to the Internet
DMOZ

“CLUSTERING” SEARCH ENGINES
KartOO
Quintura

METASEARCH ENGINES
Zuula
Dogpile

SUBJECT SPECIFIC SEARCH ENGINES
Scirus-science
Healthline-health information
Agriscape-agriculture
MathSearch-math

DOMAIN SPECIFIC SEARCH ENGINES
Searchedu.com
Google US Government Search

CONTENT SPECIFIC SEARCH ENGINES
ClipBlast & Blinkx-for video
MuviBee-music & music videos

WANT MORE?
Try http://www.searchengineguide.com/searchengines.html
A search engine directory/guide

Find and explore a search engine that interests you
Think about an assignment that incorporates the use of this search engine & meets one or more of the IL standards.

http://jujo00obo2o234ungd3t8qjfcjrs3o6k-a-sites-opensocial.googleusercontent.com	40
https://jujo00obo2o234ungd3t8qjfcjrs3o6k-a-sites-opensocial.googleusercontent.com	21
http://www.xtimeline.com	1

Finding And Evaluating Websites

by Danielle Carlock

Accessibility

Upload Details

Usage Rights

3 Embeds 62

Statistics

Finding And Evaluating Websites Presentation Transcript