This lesson has been a wake-up call for me.  I suspect that everyone else in my school is assuming that someone else is teaching the students how to evaluate information on the web.  Since no one is assuming ownership of the responsibility, it isn’t getting done.
Before individual teachers research this, each school should first decide whose responsibility it is to teach students web evaluation techniques.  The person(s) responsible should prepare a lesson or a common set of evaluation criteria.  Finally, that person or persons should train the students (or the teachers if they will ultimately be training the students).

 The reading assignments we were given were very informative with valuable suggestions.  I am concerned that many of the checklists were too long for school-age students.   If one considers the fact students do not usually have to determine the veracity of the published sources they use, we are asking too much to have them check twenty items for each web page.

 I found a great web site that gives a check list with five main points, a Power Point presentation, and even links to web-site examples to demonstrate each point in the check list.  It is titled “Evaluating Web Resources” by Jan Alexander and Marsha Ann Tate from Weidner University.  See http://www2.widener.edu/Wolfgram-Memorial-Library/webeval.htm.  If anyone knows how to enlarge a Power Point presentation from the Web so that it is full-screen, let me know.  I’d like to use this presentation if I am responsible for the training.

 I think Kathy Schrock’s advice that “all information should be verified in a traditional edited print/electronic source” is worth following.  She also suggests that the site should give information about the author, where they work, what their credentials are, and how to get in touch with them.  This is not very different information from what traditional published sources provide and seems a reasonable requirement.