This document provides guidance on evaluating information sources found on the internet. It discusses key criteria for evaluating websites such as authority, accuracy, objectivity, and currency. Participants will learn how to use these criteria to effectively evaluate websites and help students develop skills for evaluating online information sources. The document also provides examples of red flags that indicate a source may not be credible and lists several reputable databases and directories for conducting research.

1. How to evaluate sources on the World
Wide Web
Dr. Roberto T. Verdeses-Mirabal
August 10, 2014

2. This workshop will provide basic digital literacy
and technology skills useful to evaluate
information sources.

3. Participants will be able to :
• Effectively use internet sources in the
implementation of the Common Core State
Standards.
•Evaluate sources of information you find on the
web using the criteria discussed.
•Analyze how to help students develop useful
technology skills to evaluate information sources.

4. Use technology for research, critical thinking, problem
solving, decision making, communication, collaboration,
creativity and innovation.
Compare, evaluate, and select appropriate electronic
resources to locate specific information.
Select the most appropriate search engines and directories
for specific research tasks.
From Fresno County Office of Education

5. There is a lot of information online, and since
anyone can post, it is crucial to evaluate
websites before the information is considered
credible.

6. Authority
Accuracy
Objectivity
Currency

7. 1. Authority. Is it clear who is responsible for the
contents of the page? Is there a way of verifying the
legitimacy of the organization, group, company or
individual? Is there any indication of the author's
qualifications for writing on a particular topic?
2. Accuracy. Are the sources for factual information
clearly listed so they can be verified in another source?
Is the information free of grammatical, spelling, and
other typographical errors?

8. Difficult to determine authorship.
Author’s qualifications are frequently
absent.
Contact information may not be listed.

9. Anyone can publish on the Web.
Many Web resources not verified by
editors.
May includes lies, distortions, myths,
dubious data and stereotypes.
May not provide links to reputable outside
sources.

10. 3. Objectivity. Does the content appear to
contain any evidence of bias? Is there a link
to a page describing the goals or purpose of
the sponsoring organization or company? If
there is any advertising on the page, is it
clearly differentiated from the informational
content?
4. Currency. Are there dates on the page to
indicate when the page was written, when the
page was first placed on the Web, or when
the page was last revised?

11. May pretend to be objective, but only
presents one point of view.
May not differentiate advocacy vs. fact.
May provide biased information in order to
promote a product.

12. Site may not display dates.
Pages may present stale information.
Site may include dead links.

13. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4nmiJLhB5c
Sec 2:57

14. http://www.umich.edu/~engtt516/gallery.html

15. . com = commercial
. org = organization
. gov = government
. edu = education/.k12 / ac / sch
. net = network
. mil = military institution
. blogs = web blogs → many are .com

16. .com-commercial sites-usually this means
the site’s purpose is to generate revenue in
some way. Determine how they are trying to
do this.

17. •.org-organization sites-published by nonprofit
organizations-read the information that
describes who they are and why they are
publishing this information.
Find out if they are being sponsored by other
reputable organizations.

18. .gov -government sites- be sure that they
have clearly identified who they are.
“A .gov domain name carries with it a significant level of
legitimacy, trust, and authority as an official government
website that is certified, verified, and recognized by the
United States Government”.
http://www.inqbation.com/how-to-register-a-dot-gov-domain-name/

19. .edu-educational sites-be sure that they
have clearly identified who they are. An
educational – edu website can be written by
any student with space on their college’s
server. It does not mean the site is
automatically reliable.

20. .net- network infrastructure- read the
information that describes who they are and
why they are publishing this information.

21. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:General_disclaimer

22. It is unclear which company or organization is
responsible for the information on your site and/or
it doesn’t seem as if you have a copyright (©)
credit.
It is difficult to check the relevance and credibility
of your support.
You do not have an About Us page that
describes what the company or organization does.
You do not have any internal or external links.

23. When your website is deconstructed, it
leads back to a site that is not credible.
You have a lot of broken links or old
information.
Your author seems to be full of biases
and is only giving opinions rather than
facts.

24. You have a ~ in your URL.
You are out of date or are not frequently
updated.
Your purpose is to sell me something.
You do not list contact information and
resources.
You leave me with a lot of questions after I
read it.

25. You author’s background does not match the topic
at hand and he/she does not show evidence of being
knowledgeable, reliable, and truthful.
You have bad grammar or misspelled words.
You seem to be lacking a list of sources.
You contain numbers or statistics that are presented
without and identified source for them.
You do not seems to have any other sources that
present the same information as you.

26. scholar.google.com all disciplines
http://www.sagepub.com/ all disciplines
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/ all disciplines
http://www.nature.com/ Nature Publishing Group
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov The National Center for
Biotechnology Information
arxiv.org/ Physics, Mathematics, Computer
science, Quantitative biology, Quantitative finance
and statistics
http://plsinfo.org/ Peninsula Library System

27. Reference List: Electronic Sources (Web
Publications)
http://commoncore.fcoe.org/sites/commoncore.fcoe.org/files/resources/FCOE_Tec
hSkills_Flowchart_2012.pdf
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/Evaluate.html
http://library.ucsc.edu/help/research/evaluate-the-quality-and-credibility-of-your-
sources
http://library.uoregon.edu/guides/findarticles/credibility.html
http://www.library.illinois.edu/ugl/howdoi/scholarly.html
http://olinuris.library.cornell.edu/ref/research/webcrit.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4nmiJLhB5c
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-nyTL2WAjc
scholar.google.com
http://www.sagepub.com
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/
http://www.nature.com/
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
http://arxiv.org/
http://plsinfo.org/