Lateral Reading
Lateral Reading is leaving a site after a quick scan and opening up new browser tabs in order to judge the credibility of the original site.
Easy Lateral Reading Skills:
- Ask yourself who is behind the information? Identify the publisher (often found in the “about” section) and look up the wikipedia page for that publisher
- Do a deliberate Google search for the source or information you are evaluating.
- Read what trusted and reliable sources are saying about the site or claim. Try to find four or five other sources that discuss your source. (If you can’t find that many, that’s a sign that your source might not be good.)
Fact Checking Resources:
- Wikipedia – A great resource for lateral reading. Wikipedia is often a fact-checkers first stop – and site for you to witness fact-checking in action.
- Snopes – One of the first online fact-checking websites.
- Politifact – A fact-checking website that rates the accuracy of claims by elected officials and others who speak up in American politics. Includes a Truth-o-meter.
- FactCheck – Site monitors the factual accuracy of political statements regardless of party affiliation.
- All Sides – Site provides multiple angles on the same story.
Apple Recalls Thousands of Ear Buds
Databases:
Utah’s Online Library
Remember: Look online if you need to research
High Schools —>Gale Reference Collection 9-12
—>Opposing Viewpoints
—>Global Issues in Context
—>Gale OneFile News
EBSCO
–>Select “All Databases”
We also have history databases that have been purchased for the school to use:
World History in Context
U.S History in Context
Password: bengals
Search by name
Check under the reference section once you search
On the right you can find the e mail option as well as find the citation.
Google Tips
Tips for Googling:
- If you aren’t getting the search results you want change your keywords. Make them more specific or less specific, use synonyms, or rephrase.
- Use quotation marks to search for an exact phrase.
e.g. “Wolves of Yellowstone” will only return search results with that exact phrase
- use search term site:domain to pull up websites with only a specific domain
e.g. wolf site:edu will only pull up .edu sites with “wolf” in them. You can do this for all domains, .edu .org, .gov.
- Add a dash (–) before a word or site to exclude all results that include that word. This is especially useful for words with multiple meanings, like Jaguar the car brand and jaguar the animal. e.g. jaguar speed -car
Citation Help
Scrible (login with gmail using your csddocs)
Questions? Feel free to e mail Ms. Bates.
