A New Type of Literacy

Recently in my high school history class, we have been learning about media literacy. We learned how to search for information on Google and use online resources through an activity called A Google A Day. It is a fun activity in which you are asked a question that you can't just Google to find the answer. You have to try many different searches and try many different answers until you find the right one. At times it was frustrating because no matter how many different answers we found none of them were correct. Google would only accept one answer so it was hard to figure out which one it wanted when there were many. Through this experience I learned that there is not always going to be a straightforward answer and sometimes it may take multiple searches in order to find the right one. The questions also got harder to answer as the activity went on.




Reading, Mike. Google Chrome. Digital image. Google Apps for Education Tips & Tricks. Google, 21 Jan. 2013. Web. 6 Sept. 2014. 
 

Authenticity, reliability and accuracy are key components in deciding whether or not a website can be used for school. Authenticity is how genuine the information and the source is. If the information matches up with what you already have and the source is a well known or dependable then the website can be deemed authentic. Reliability is how trustworthy a website is. If you can not trust the source then it should not be used in school. Accuracy is how correct the information you are receiving is. In order to test these, we used the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus website. After analyzing the website, I deemed that it was not an appropriate source to use in school. It is not appropriate because the author is not a reliable source and the information given is not accurate or real. At first glance, the website looks like an authentic website, because of the web address, layout, fonts, phrasing, images and links. As it turns out, this website is just another internet hoax.