Group items tagged

In this day and age, where anyone with access to the internet can create a website, it is critical that we as educators teach our students how to evaluate web content. These wonderfully funny hoax websites, test readers on their ability to evaluate websites. These hoax sites are a great way to bring humor and hands-on evaluation into your classroom, and test your students' web resource evaluation skills.

"Some library websites feel disconnected from the library as a whole. Rather than looking at a library's web presence as a burden or an obligation, libraries should see their website as an extension of the library itself. Like the physical library space, library collections, and library services and programs, the library's website is an iterative project that requires maintenance and care. Websites should be updated and evaluated regularly. They must strive to meet the specific needs of the community the library serves."

A bibliography is an alphabetical list, by author, of the sources (books, journals, websites, etc) you have used to research and write your assignment. A bibliography usually includes information such as the author, title, publisher and date. An annotation is a concise summary and/or evaluation of the value or relevance of each source. An annotated bibliography combines these two elements and provides bibliographic information plus a summary and/ or evaluation of each of the sources you have used. An annotated bibliography may be one part of a larger assessment item.

The capacity to critically evaluate information is central within the research process of locating resources for academic purposes. Apart from being able to differentiate between fact and fiction, it's important for you to be able to assess the relevance, accuracy and suitability of information to your particular purpose.

"Using a six-point strategy, teachers can help students learn about responsible web research by assessing the validity of most information that they'll encounter online."

Teaching and measuring critical evaluations skills through developed assessments of civic online reasoning-the ability to judge the credibility of digital information about social and political issues."

Infographic to support critical evaluation of scientific reporting

"So are we! Welcome to Petrol Direct - the UK's leading supplier of all varieties of petrol, diesel and even biofuels delivered direct! We save you money by sourcing all our fuels from other countries in the EU that have a much lower tax rate than the UK."

This lesson was developed as part of a project begun in Centennial School District to teach Internet literacy skills to fifth grade students. The project began with the creation of this web site, which contains fictional biographies of world explorers, and a series of lessons designed to introduce students to the idea that the Internet is a less reliable source of information than print sources, and while there is an abundance of information available at our fingertips, researchers need to think critically about the facts found there.

"The Pacific Northwest tree octopus (Octopus paxarbolis) can be found in the temperate rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula on the west coast of North America."

"Over 2,500 dogs are already enjoying a better life at Dog Island. Separated from the anxieties of urban life, dogs on Dog Island are healthy dogs who live a natural, healthy and happy life, free from the stress and hardship associated with daily life among humans."

"This interactive is designed to get students to establish good news-reading habits by making sure they verify news publications and author credentials, and cross-check with other sources before deciding whether something is 'real' news or not."

"Readability calculator (a.k.a reading level checker) helps you to successfully identify what grade kid could easily read and understand your article / text."

"The Readability Test Tool provides a quick and easy way to test the readability of your work."

"The Drop Bear legend tells of a large, arboreal, predatory marsupial related to the Koala that 'drops' on it's prey."

"This service analyses the readability of all rendered content. Unfortunately, this will include navigation items, and other short items of content that do not make up the part of the page that is intended to be the subject of the readability test. "

"Our Automatic Readability Checker takes a sample of your writing and calculates the number of sentences, words, syllables, and characters in your sample. Our program takes the output of these numbers and plugs them into seven popular readability formulas. These readability formulas (see below) will let you know the reading level and grade level of your text and help you determine if your audience can read your writing."

"The dos and don'ts of designing for accessibility are general guidelines, best design practices for making services accessible in government. Currently, there are six different posters in the series that cater to users from these areas: low vision, D/deaf and hard of hearing, dyslexia, motor disabilities, users on the autistic spectrum and users of screen readers."

The Internet is a swelling ocean of information. Navigating through the steady flow of that information ocean can be hazardous. This is certainly true of a student who is not information fluent. The driving question is what are some smart online research strategies? Luckily this falls within the realm of the Essential Fluencies, namely Information Fluency. This involves the 5As process: Asking the right questions Acquiring the knowledge Analyzing the content for relevancy and credibility Applying the knowledge to our use Assessing the effectiveness of our message