Evaluating Online Information

Laney College LibraryAnn Buchalter, MLIS

Part 1: Help Google help you! Locating Academically Acceptable websites.

Part 2: Apply evaluative criteria (Website Evaluation Form) to website you want to use as a source.

Today you are going to learn how to:

Part 1: Help Google help YOU!

Google Search Tips…

Limit search to specific domains:.edu (educational).gov (government).org (non-profit organizations)

Limit search to specific file types:filetype: pdf filetype: doc

What’s in a (domain) name…

.com – commercial (for profit) entities

.org – nonprofit entities

.edu – educational institutions

.gov – federal government agencies

.mil – US military

.int – international organizations

State or Country of origin .de - Germany .ca.us – California, US .ca - Canada

Use Google Advanced Search Option

Breakdown of a URL:

http://www.stanford.edu/~ccarson/articles/am_left.htm

http:// is the protocol or access methodwww.stanford.edu is the domain or host name.edu is the top level domain~ccarson/articles/am_left.htm is the directory

path folder on the domain computer

Part 2: Evaluate, evaluate, evaluate…

DomainAppearance SponsorRelevanceAuthority

Web Page Evaluation Criteria

DOMAIN NAME

1. Domain-some are more “trustworthy” than others…

2. Web Site Title

3. Access Date- this is the date YOU found it

Criteria #1

“On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.”

not good

Criteria #2 APPEARANCE (part 1)

1. Is there a lot advertising on the site?

2. Does the site look professionally done?

3. Are there any noticeable spelling or grammatical errors?

Criteria #2 APPEARANCE (part 2)

1. Check the links—working? relevant to the page?

2. Has web page has been updated recently?

Criteria #3: SPONSOR

1. Who is paying to put this site on the internet?

2. About Us/Contact Us page?

3. If the web page is located on a specific organization’s web site?

4. Is the site intended to be entertaining, educational, business related, or personal?

1. Does the information contribute to your research in a significant way?

2. Is the material original research? Opinion or commentary on a topic?

3. How does it compare to your other sources?

Criteria #4 RELEVANCE

AUTHORITY

1. Can you CLEARLY and QUICKLY identify the author of the web page/document you are using?

2. Can you determine what the author’s credentials are?

3. Did the author provide a bibliography?

Criteria #5

LET’S HAVE A LOOK:Testing…

site #2

site #1

Random…