Information Savvy

With the vast amount of information readily available through the internet and the increased prevelance of ameteurs creating websites, blogs and wikipages, how do we sift out the trustworthy information from the opinion? Work. Isn't it always the answer? We need to question everything at least until we've proven a site or a source to be reputable. It is our responsibility as adults, parents, professionals, teachers, and role models to teach our children how to do the work for themselves. Unfortunately, there will always be "on the job training" and some lessons wil only be taught by trial and error. What work is involved with establishing credibility? Read the information on a site. Does it sound creditible? Check the sources cited? Are cited sources? Is the information coming from professionals or from individuals? Double check to see if the same information can be found on another site. What about statistics, graphs and charts? Is the data used to create them from professional sources? Does it sound reasonable? If we teach children the necessary tools to verify information they find and read on the internet the chances that they will protect themselves from false sources and information will be greater.