Website Evaluation Stamp

I’m working on collaborative group research projects with Y7 at the moment. I want to create a simple and yet sophisticated system for evaluating sources used in the research. I’m thinking a little table for each reference used, acting a bit like a stamp to show sources have been considered for reliability and bias. However, I’m not sure where to limit the categories. Here are the ones I have so far:

  1. Identify author? Y/N
  2. Identify date created or last edited? Y/N
  3. Identify target audience? Y/N
  4. Copyright mark? Y/N
  5. Contact Info? Y/N
  6. Advertising? Y/N
  7. Can you tell if it is biased? Y/N
  8. Does it have reference links to other sites? Y/N
  9. Can you see evidence to prove statements? Y/N
  10. Does it use a reliable domain?

I think the best approach is a small table that provides a column for Y or N. This will focus the pupil on checking the reliability of the website as part of their research. However, it might be better to have other categories:

  1. Image
  2. Fact
  3. Opinion
  4. Statistic
  5. Quote

These might be incorporated into the same stamp, maybe as delete as appropriate. It might look something like this:Website Evaluation Stamp

Any thoughts anyone? Is this over the top? Would it take too long to complete this checklist for each source? Maybe just use it for major/critical information sources. They will be also referencing all sources using a simplified Havard method. However, this stamp might be useful to help them learn the importance of website provenance.

Website Evaluation Stamp

3 thoughts on “Website Evaluation Stamp

  1. I think you might have issues with using this rubric for all sources. Edexcel GCSE ICT has a source table section and the assessment for that isn’t nearly as detailed. For research I would suggest using as a starting point the Harvard method and then stripping that down into what pupils need to do now so that they are prepared for something like Harvard in future.

    What about:
    – source discrimination
    – Author
    – Article metadata including link
    – copyright

    1. daibarnes says:

      Thanks Brian. I thought it might be OTT as well. However, I didn’t want to be restricted by anything other than what might help pupils evaluate a source and learn about reliability on the way. I think it will, as you imply, get a little overly complicated for the pupils. Creating something that structures a Harvard type system might be more beneficial to all concerned. 🙂

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