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1. Select a topic dealt with in the text for your Internet search. Examples might include, for example, educational research, multicultural education, bilingual education, whole language instruction, Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotsky, Erik Erikson, Lawrence Kohlberg, cultural diversity, standardized testing, authentic assessment and so forth, using topics throughout the text.
2. Use academic cliche as much as possible to narrow down your
search (e.g., use "gender role" rather than "sex
role"). Use singal form of nouns rather than plural (by
doing that you include pages with both usage). Use quotation
marks to search for phrases: "gender role". Use * for
truncation: moral*. Use AND, OR, NOT, and NEAR operators (e.g.,
"moral development" AND "culture"). Search
terms should be lower case unless the terms are proper names.
3. Search the Internet using the UCSC Web
Research Tools or Microsoft
or one or more Web Search Engines (e.g., AltaVista,
EINet
Galaxy, InfoSeek,
Lycos, Yahoo, Web
Crawler /it is a multiple search engine/, or Magellan), to locate
resources related to the topic you have selected.
To evaluate the quality of the information as a possible
research citation, check to see if the web page meets the
following criteria:
Note: The greater the number of
questions listed below answered "yes",
the more likely the source is of high quality. The questions in Bold
Type must be answered "yes"
for the source to be of value in your research.
Criterion #1: AUTHORITY
1.Is it clear who is sponsoring the page?
2.Is there a link to a page describing the purpose of the
sponsoring organization?
3.Is there a way of verifying the legitimacy of the page's
sponsor? That is, is there a phone number or postal address to
contact for more information? (Simply an email address is not
enough).
4.Is it clear who wrote the material and are the author's
qualifications for writing on this topic clearly stated?
5.If the material is protected by copyright, is the name of the
copyright holder given?
Criterion #2: ACCURACY
1.Are the sources for any factual information clearly listed so
they can be verified in another source?
2.Is the information free of grammatical, spelling, and other
typographical errors? (These kinds of errors not only indicate a
lack of quality control, but can actually produce inaccuracies in
information).
3.Is it clear who has the ultimate responsibility for the
accuracy of the content of the material?
4.If statistical data is presented in graphs and/or charts, are
they clearly labeled and easy to read?
Criterion #3: OBJECTIVITY
1.Is the information provided as a public service?
2.Is the information free of advertising?
3.If there is any advertising on the page, is it clearly
differentiated from the informational content?
Criterion #4: CURRENCY
1.Are there dates on the page to indicate:
1.When the page was written?
2.When the page was first placed on the Web?
3.When the page was last revised?
2.Are there any other indications that the material is kept
current?
3.If material is presented in graphs and/or charts, is it clearly
stated when the data was gathered?
4.If the information is published in different editions, is it
clearly labeled what edition the page is from?
Criterion #5: COVERAGE
1.Is there an indication that the page has been completed, and is
not still under construction?
2.If there is a print equivalent to the Web page, is there a
clear indication of whether the entire work is available on the
Web or only parts of it?
3.If the material is from a work which is out of copyright (as is
often the case with a dictionary or thesaurus) has there been an
effort to update the material to make it more current?
This checklist compiled by: J. Alexander & M. Tate: July
1996
Copyright Widener University 1996
Wolfgram Memorial Library, Widener University, Chester, PA.
A Brief Ciatation Guide to Internet Sources in History and the
Humanities https://ipisun.jpte.hu/~joe/abel/call/citation.html
Bibliographic Formats for Citing Electronic Information https://www.uvm.edu/~xli/reference/estyles.html