Using Google Wisely

After my last blog posting about Google, I have continued to work with my seventh grade students to evaluate web sites. We first examined the Dog Island web site to determine if it was valid, and it passed many of the characteristics of a valid web site. (Dog Island purports to be a place where one can send a dog to live “free from the stress and hardship associated with daily life among humans.”)

Not until we researched which other web sites link to the Dog Island site did students become more skeptical. (You can do this by typing link:http://thedogisland.com into Google or Altavista search engines.) As we scrolled the list of results, we noticed references to hoax and bogus web sites. We returned to the Dog Island site, dug a little deeper, and finally came upon its disclaimer.

I then asked students to use Google to find sites to support building background knowledge for their social studies unit. They had to cite 4 ways they knew each source was trustworthy. We discussed their findings and sometimes had to refer back to the Dog Island site for “trustworthy” characteristics. We collaboratively generated the following list of mostly infallible ways to judge the veracity of web sites:

• The site was created by a reputable organization, such as a museum, the government, or an institution of learning (pbs).
• The author is an expert on the topic.
• Bibliographic resources are provided and accurate.
• The information is validated by other resources.

As we continue researching this year, I will review and strongly encourage the use of our library databases, as well. But, for now, if students are going to rely heavily on Google, this seems like a reasonable approach for them to take.

I remain a little puzzled that students weren't quicker to doubt the validity of the Dog Island web site. Anyone have any thoughts about that? Other hoax sites you could share with kids include Save the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus, Velcro Crop, and DHMO.