While I was doing my website evaluations, I used the opportunity to search some topics that I am currently looking for information on. For my first search, I typed in the words "special education". The page that I clicked on was www.ed.gov. This site was a great site for me to evaluate in that it fit almost all of the criteria of a good site. It looks nice, it has a .gov domain, and it has a lot of great information. I do, however, know that this type of result will not always occur. I think that there are more good sites than bad, but how you search makes a big difference in what results you come up with. For instance, if you spell a word wrong in your search, I think you are more likely to come up with bad sites. When I was doing my second search, I searched financial resources for edaucators. I spelled educators wrong on purpose to see what my results were. The link I clicked on was www.mymoneyblog.com. While there is nothing wrong with this blog, per se, it is not an example of a "good" site to find valid information. It is written by someone who is sharing personal opinion.
I think that the website evaluation form helped me to see that the second site I looked at was not a good source of information. I have spent a lot of time in the past searching the web for good information to help me care for my son, who has a rare seizure disorder. The website evaluation gave me some good information that I can use for that purpose! For instance, I never realized that the design of the site is an indicator as to how good the website is. From now on, if I run across a site that is hard to use, I am going to use some of the other criteria that we learned about to further investigate.
I think it is essential to evaluate websites. When I am teaching, I certainly do not want to teach my students the wrong information. Also, for the personal reasons I mentioned above, accurate information is critical!
The web is a very useful tool, if it is used correctly!
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