Website Evaluations

There are so many websites out there, and it can be quite overwhelming at times knowing which websites are worthy of a click and which can be chucked in the "fail" category. So how do we, as teachers, evaluate the worthiness of a website?

Websites which can help one make that decision:

-Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators
- Instructional Technology Modules- Evaluating Websites
- The Good, The Bad & The Ugly:or, Why It's a Good Idea to Evaluate Web Sources
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Personal Evaluation of Website example:

Website Evaluated: Field Guides: Natural Wonders

• Look for special requirements (browsers, plug-ins..etc) Windows 95 & Explorer 4.0 (minimum)
  
• Primary Purpose of website Virtual Field Trip, Interactive Simulation
  
• Reliability of Author - Contact, Author, and Credit Information Listed
  
• Reliability of Publishing Body- (I had a hard time finding this information)
  
• Is the website's information bias in any form? (political, advertisements...)- The Website did not seem bias in any way.
  
• Accuracy of Information - This was hard to say because all of the natural wonders are linked to different websites with their individual sources and information. Some of these links did not come off as professional websites.
  
• How current is the information? The website was created in 2007. Some of the links were dead.
  
• Design, Accessibility & Usability Navigation was very confusing. Some of the links are not even in English!

I would not recommend this site because it is filled with random, dead links, and even non-English websites. FAIL
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