Point and Click

According to http://www.library.jhu.edu/researchhelp/general/evaluating/ (John Hopkins University) "The World Wide Web offers information and data from all over the world. Because so much information is available, and because that information can appear to be fairly “anonymous”, it is necessary to develop skills to evaluate what you find. When you use a research or academic library, the books, journals and other resources have already been evaluated by scholars, publishers and librarians. Every resource you find has been evaluated in one way or another before you ever see it. When you are using the World Wide Web, none of this applies. There are no filters. Because anyone can write a Web page, documents of the widest range of quality, written by authors of the widest range of authority, are available on an even playing field. Excellent resources reside along side the most dubious. The Internet epitomizes the concept of Caveat lector: Let the reader beware. This document discusses the criteria by which scholars in most fields evaluate print information, and shows how the same criteria can be used to assess information found on the Internet."

It is great to have our students using the WEB to find information - what better resource - that is - if we are using resources which are based on fact and not someones opinion. We, as educators must remind our students that when they back up their opinions in their papers on what they have researched they have researched from a reputable source. It is great to point and click and cut and paste and retype in one's own words - but we need to teach our students that they must be using sources that are reputable. Our students do provide the web sites they used but do many teachers check that the web sites are viable. Do we go the full distance to make sure that the information is valid or do we just check that they do not plagiarize and supply the web site to support their findings?