Third Grade Web Site Evaluation Unit Plan

This is a 6 lesson unit plan designed to teach third graders how to evaluate a web site based on five commonly used criteria, by asking five questions: Is it relevant? Is it suitable? Is it current? Is it authoritative? Is it biased?

Each lesson includes tips for explaining the meaning of the concepts and plenty of examples to illustrate. The lessons progress from one question to another, building on previous knowledge and providing practice each time.

I have included two worksheets with rubrics geared toward specific web sites for practice, as well as a generic rubric that can be used for any web site evaluation. Students can gain valuable practice using a rubric, if they have never done so before.

This unit would be appropriate for use with fourth and fifth graders as well, especially if they have never discussed information evaluation before. It can be adjusted to the needs of your class by adding more or less scaffolding, discussion and group work.

The topics in the unit lend themselves to critical thinking and class discussion, and can be done with students in pairs.


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