Evaluating Online Information

The COR curriculum provides free lessons and assessments that help you teach students to evaluate online information that affects them, their communities, and the world.

Online syllabus plan for a data and source evaluation course to be presented by the Information School at the University of Washington.

A 2020 lesson in which students examine their own information-consuming and sharing habits, then learn practical tips for thinking critically about news.

This online course teaches students to fact and source check as a regular information consumption behavior. The course is focused upon 5 (30-minute) lessons applicable to an entry-level college course.

This "Editorial Standards: A Simple Guide" provides active learning modules on accuracy, impartiality, privacy, and many important aspects of ethical journalism. This is a great way to help students understand the underpinnings of credible journalism. (Requires Flash)

An online news game invented by the American University Game Lab that tests users’ ability to discern real from fake news. Levels are available from middle school to college.

This syllabus includes readings and case studies that address the historical context of disinformation in the United States, engaging with issues of power, culture, and social injustice.

This 2020 lesson helps students practice looking critically at data in the news.

Provides 10 fake news examples, some more difficult to identify than others, which can be used as part of class exercises.

This January 2017 article deconstructs how one successful viral fake news story was created, and why.

This digital research platform links together theory, methods, and practice for mapping media manipulation and disinformation campaigns. It features a bank of case studies, which can be filtered by variables such as tactics, targets, mitigation, outcomes, and keywords.

This lesson plan provides an overview of a 2019 viral media story, links to images and articles, and discussion questions allowing a class to examine the story from a critical lens.

Looking for examples to use in your own lessons related to news or media literacy? This Snopes archive is a great place to start.

Provides lesson plans, research articles and guidance for teaching news literacy, including The News Literacy Course Pack, specifically designed for college instructors.

The News Literacy Project is a national education nonprofit offering nonpartisan, independent programs that teach students how to know what to believe in the digital age. It includes "Get Smart" resources for students such as rumor reviews and quizzes to test your ability to spot fake news.

Poynter Institute for Media Studies is a non-profit journalism school and research organization. Their site contains excellent fact checking resources and their MediaWise section offers support for teaching media literacy concepts.

Public Editor is a crowd-sourced effort to clean up the news through a credibility rating system. Students can practice flagging misleading or false content, much as they can learn to source-check in a wiki edit-a-thon.