Library, Marblehead Village School, 1.25 hours

“Promoting a love and appreciation for reading and good literature.
Creating capable and critical users of information and technology.”

That is the mission statement listed on the VillageSchool Library website immediately above Mrs. Soghomonian’s name.  This mission statement was the basis of today’s observation of a 4^th grade class.

Village School Library Website

            As always the lesson criteria were listed clearly on the easel for the students to see upon entering the library.  They were as follows:

·         “Just because it is out there doesn’t mean it’s true.”

·         What about Wikipedia?

·         The clue is in the URL.

After a brief follow up from the previous lesson on creating Microsoft Word documents to see what the students retained and to query if any students had used this skill at home, Mrs. Soghomonian asked them what types of resources the students used for their recent research project.  Out of a class of 21 children an informal poll revealed the following source usage:

·         Database – 2 children

·         Books – 6 children

·         Google – 16 children

·         Wikipedia – 10 children

Children stated that they liked Wikipedia because it has “good info” and “it is always there when you need it.”  I was surprised at the overwhelming 76% of resources that were from Google and Wikipedia.  The lingering question is, “What is the validity of the information that the students used?”  This was a nice way for the librarian to delve into a discussion about why Google and Wikipedia are not always the best.  She reminded the students that they need to always be good “information detectives.”  Mrs. Soghomonian decided to search on “Inuit.”  She showed how the first two Google results of the 9,540,000 results had nothing to do with the Inuit.  The third result was for Wikipedia.  The librarian took a moment to refresh their memories of the questions that you need to ask when evaluating a website:

·         Who wrote it?

·         When was it written?

·         What special features does it have?

·         Can I read it and understand it?

Focusing back on Wikipedia, she made it crystal clear that each and everyone in that class could go on the site and alter it, therefore becoming an author.  To further give the children tools to find a site author, Mrs. Soghomonian used the Wikipedia left side bar tab “About Wikipedia.”  Here it states that Wikipedia is written collaboratively by largely anonymous internet volunteers who write without pay.  (Each of the underlined words was discussed to ensure that the students fully understood what they were reading.)  In this case, there was no idea who wrote the site and if that person(s) had any authority about the Inuit.  The children were able to correctly state where in a book you find this information.  Making the connection from print resources to internet resources was a nice way for them to recall the previous skills that they were taught to find out about an author from a print resource that the children were using.

           

            The children brainstormed possible motives for someone to include incorrect information on a Wikipedia page such as an attempt at humor, to be mean, or that the person might not know the information was false.  While Wikipedia volunteers do go on and check information, you just never know if what you are looking for is accurate….so BEWARE and be a good detective!  The librarian told them that no matter the site, the students should always look for the “about” and “disclaimer” tabs often at the bottom of the home page.  The most eye opening moment came when the librarian clicked on the disclaimer tab.  Even Wikipedia makes no guarantee of the accuracy of its information.

Wikipedia Disclaimer

            After seeing the potential high probability of inaccurate information that they were using for their projects, Mrs. Soghomonian again polled the class to generate other databases that would be great sources of information.  Some students volunteered World Book, Kids Info Bits & Culturegrams.  While the librarian did agree that these 3 sources might not be as easy to use as Google, the information is checked and you can use it without reservation.

           

            Finally, she reminded them about the clue in the URL.  The Uniform Resource Locator gives the website’s address on the internet.  I was amazed that they children were only familiar with “.com” & “.net” URLs.  After a listing and definition for “.K12, .org, .edu, .gov, .ca and .uk” she asked them which ones would most likely have the most information for research purposes.  The top there were “.org, .edu and .gov” of the list generated.

            This philosophy of being a detective is not a new realization.  Behind the librarians book check out area on a large poster is the following:

           

An Information Detective Wants to Know:

1.      Who wrote it? Why?

a.       Are they qualified?

b.      How I heard of them?

c.       Clue in the URL?

2.      When was it published?

3.      How is the information organized?

4.      How do I locate information?

5.      What special features help me to understand?

6.      Is the information useful?

a.       Does it make sense?

I was eager to see how Mrs. Soghomonian would approach this important skill.  Since I just took a class involving website evaluation prior to this one, I found she did a great job of making the criteria age appropriate without going into too many details to bog the children down.  Just being aware of what is out there and where a good place to search is will set them up to be good researchers.  She hit home the fact that anyone can make a website and that the information that the search yields on Google is not always the best.  In case the students forget all the criteria that Mrs. Soghomonian taught them and is posted in the library, the same information can be found on her Glog that is linked to her library page.  It is definitely worth taking the time to review.  When it comes to a research paper, can you really afford not to evaluate the information you will be using?

Mrs. Soghomonian’s Glog on Website Evaluation