Tips for Using the Web as an
Information Source
Compiled for the Massachusetts
Envirothon, October 2006
Evaluating Web Pages:
Techniques to Apply & Questions to Ask
UC Berkeley - Teaching Library Internet
Workshops
A thorough step-by-step
approach to evaluating web pages, including questions to ask and why to ask
them:
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/Evaluate.html
Evaluating Internet Research Sources
Robert Harris,
A classic site (date:
November 17, 1997), still recommended.
It looks at the Internet in the larger context of the variety of information
available to us:
http://www.virtualsalt.com/evalu8it.htm
A new (June 2006) free, fun online
tutorial developing skills for Internet research.
http://www.vts.intute.ac.uk/detective/
See also
* Research Tools listed on the
http://www.comcol.umass.edu/academics/researchliteracy/index.html
* Links to more web sites on evaluating web sites, including some sites
specific to science and education, at “Evaluation
Criteria” on the Mass Technology Collaborative’s “Resources for Teachers”
page http://www.masstech.org/cleanenergy/curriculum/resources.htm
* What about Wikipedia? A good discussion of the value of this online
open-source encyclopedia can be found (where else?) at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wikipedia
Do you have suggestions for sites that will help Mass Envirothon teams to
use the web effectively for their research?
Contact Will Snyder, UMass Extension, at wsnyder@umext.umass.edu