The Importance of Accurate Information

Many say that learning by doing is the most effective way to learn different material, and today in history class, we did just that.  In order to truly understand how to find sources that are accurate, authentic, and reliable, we did different activities and visited different websites which helped us to be able to identify scholarly resources and which signs to look for in a website which may show that they are not reliable.  Using information that fits the three different criteria of being accurate, authentic, and reliable, is crucial in doing research because if you have inaccurate or unauthentic information, not only will you get a poorer grade, you'll also be spreading that false information on to others.

A Google A Day is a website which gives you different questions to answer using the Google search engine that is timed, making it in a game style.  It's very useful in practicing effective ways of searching the Internet to get the correct information, and the most detailed information on the topic you're looking for.  There's even a tips and tricks section which helps teach you about different techniques on searching the Internet and gives you examples so that you can better understand how to apply the tricks into your future search endeavors.  You can even visit the website yourself and try playing as well at http://agoogleaday.com/#game=started

Accuracy, authenticity, and reliability are the three important criteria which we use in identifying if a source is scholarly to use, and are all extremely important.  Accuracy is the quality of the information and if it's all correct and true.  Authenticity is if the website is what it claims to be about.  Reliability is if the source is certified or trustworthy in the area that the have published the information about.  We visited a website in history class about the "Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus" http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/, and discovered that it would not be a website we would be able to use for a school related project or paper.  Although the website is technically authentic because it is all about the "Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus" as it said, it is not accurate because the information is all untrue, and is not reliable because the creator the webpage is not knowledgeable in wildlife or ecology at all.