Students need to possess the procedural knowledge and engage in sufficient practice to be able to determine whether a website contains information that is accurate, credible, relevant, and ultimately is useful to their goal. While some websites are quite obviously not worthy of one's time from an academic standpoint, many more websites reach the upper levels of search results that appear to be legitimate academic resources, yet actually contain false information, biased viewpoints, or are simply click-bait for the purpose of advertising dollars. Whether for learning activities or just personal use, being able to discern between fact and fiction and information and infomercial is a critical skill set for anyone. Additionally, in our instantaneous information world, we need to be able to not only discern how reliable information is, but also whether that information is even useful for our purpose. These are all skills that require some training, a practical awareness, and practice to master.
The purpose of this activity is to guide learners to find and critically evaluate websites when searching for knowledge level information on a given topic. Included here is a lesson seed that can be adapted to meet the needs of specific classrooms in the instruction of the critical analysis of websites. There are two custom checklist guides and selected outside resources that can be used with learners to assist in critical evaluation.