Education Standards
Individual Worksheet
Paired/Group Worksheet
Vocabulary Worksheet
Using Lateral Reading Skills to Evaluate Sources
Overview
Students learn the skill of lateral reading to help identify potential bias in online resources. Students focus their investigation on famous cases involving counterfeiting and fraud - a forensics tie in.
LESSON DESCRIPTION
Using Lateral Reading Skills to Evaluate Sources
Author of the Lesson: Alexa Lougee
Lesson Summary/Overview: Students learn the skill of lateral reading to help identify potential bias in online resources. Students focus their investigation on famous cases involving counterfeiting and fraud - a forensics tie in.
LESSON GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
Alignment and Objectives
Content Standards: 11-12.RI.7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats to address a question or solve a problem.
Content Objectives: Students can bring together a variety of sources of information to address a question. Students can evaluate an online resource for potential bias.
ELP Standards: ELP.9-12.4 An ELL can construct grade-appropriate oral and written claims and support them with reasoning and evidence.
Language (ELP) Objectives:
Supporting Academic Language
Language Functions: Argumentation
Language Modalities: Writing
Vocabulary: (this may need to be pre taught prior to this lesson) bias, sponsor, influence, forgery, reliable, expert, perspective, lateral, evaluate
Syntax or Sentence Structure(s):
Discourse:
LESSON PREPARATION
Considerations
Prerequisite Knowledge and Skills:
Instructional Materials
Resources, Materials, and Technology required or recommended for the lesson:
Copies of the following:
Students should be familiar with the following topics:
- bias
- forgery
- forensics
- Shakespeare
- Abraham Lincoln
- Adolf Hitler/WWII
Technology & Resources:
- Internet
- Tablet or computer
- Paper
- Copies of guided question worksheets for students
Learning Supports
Socio-emotional supports:
Chunking of material to provide breaks for students. Assign students to specific “jobs” during the lesson or when working in pairs.
Cultural & Linguistic Responsiveness:
Accessibility:
Instructional Supports
Differentiation:
Differentiated sentence starters.
Provide website sources leveled for students.
L1 Supports:
Video clips in L1 to introduce concepts such as: forgery, Shakespeare’s lost plays, etc.
Provide translated versions of guided question worksheets, or include on main worksheets.
L2 Development (by level):
LESSON PROCEDURES
Anticipatory Set/Motivation/Hook
Time: 5-10 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
Focused Instruction (Teacher-as-Model)
Time: 15 - 20 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
Model a web page evaluation (see script below). Teacher projects computer screen. Students watch as the teacher models.
Getting Started:
- Hand out copies of “Intro to Lateral Reading”
- I’m trying to figure out if this is a reliable source (use this site or find your own: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2010/mar/15/shakespeare-lost-play-double-falsehood) of information on Shakespeare’s lost play. I’m going to share how I approach this problem. I will model the process I go through as I try to decide who is behind the information and what biases’ might exist.
- Before I start reading the information, I need to quickly look over it, step back and ask:
- Who is behind this information?
- Who wrote the words?
- Who created the website?
When I am searching for the answers to these questions, I am also trying to figure out the authors’ perspective, if they are an expert on the topic, and why they might be sharing this information. This helps us decide if this is a good or reliable source.
- The link takes me to this article. But before I start reading, I’m going to stop and first try to answer some of the questions we talked about:
- Who’s behind it?
- Who’s saying this?
- What website am I on?
- How can I answer these questions?
- Find and read the “About” page
- This is a “news” website.
- It says it is owned by Guardian Media Group.
- What can I learn about Guardian Media Group?
Guardian Media Group
- This page makes it seem pretty reliable. They say they are “independent” and free from political and commercial influence. Generally, people want “unbiased” news.
- This About Page was likely written by the same people who created this website. They probably wouldn’t say anything negative about the company or the people who write for the company.
- What else would motivate them to seem reliable and trustworthy?
- (status, money, followers, advertising, subscribers, etc)
- I should find another source to see what others say about “The Guardian” newspaper and Guardian Media Group. Some people call this “lateral reading” because we are going to open up new web tabs and search for information that shows what other sources say about this website and organization. Remember, lateral means “side to side.”
Lateral Reading
- To start my lateral reading, I’m going to:
- Open a new tab
- Search for “Guardian Media Group” - I put this in quotes so my search engine will find results with these words together.
- I want to avoid any results that come from Guardian Media Group because I want to know what people outside the organization say.
- (Find a result and examine the page for anything that may be an influence on the organization. What kind of bias might the source have? Remind students of what bias means.)
- Before deciding to trust this information, I need to remember that this is just one source. It’s better to get information from multiple, reliable sources on a topic.
- Note: If you want to spend more time on this, you could continue your modeling by going back to the search results and looking at additional sources).
Closing
- So, before I could trust this website, I had to:
- Ask questions
- Look for answers outside of the organization
- Read laterally by finding multiple outside, reliable sources of information
Guided Instruction (Teacher-to-Student Joint Responsibility)
Time: 10-15 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
Debriefing
Discuss:
- What did you notice me doing?
- Why was it important for me to look beyond the “About” page to find out about the organization?
- Why should we be cautious about what an organization writes on its “About” page?
- Why is lateral reading necessary to find out more about the sponsors of a website?
Establishing Guidelines:
Ask: What information do we need about an organization or author to help us decide if they are a reliable source on a specific subject or topic? Help students consider multiple aspects of a source:
- The organization or author’s perspective
- Why they might be motivated to present the information
- How much expertise or authority they have on the topic:
- Are authors trained journalists (such as professional news outlets or fact checking organizations) or have backgrounds in the specific subjects they’re covering?
- Do they have a way to make sure the information they produce is factual and trustworthy (like editors, fact checkers, and review processes like peer review).
- Are there systems in place to catch, correct, and admit mistakes when they are made (like corrections sections).
- Are there obvious conflicts of interest?
Group Application (Student-to-Student Joint Responsibility)
Time: 20 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
- Hand out “Paired Lateral Reading: Guiding Questions.”
- Students work in pairs to search for and evaluate sources of information for the “Lincoln Love Letters” case
- You can have students find their own sources OR provide them with some.
- Some suggested sites:
- “From the Archives: The Lincoln Love Letters: A literary hoax forged in San Diego”
- “Lincoln’s Lost Love Letters”
- Share Out and Discuss
- Pairs of students share what they learned about each site as they read laterally.
- Point out information they learned by doing lateral reading and what they might have missed if they had only looked at the initial site.
- Remind students why the question “Who is behind this information? is important and why lateral reading is a good tool for learning about online sources.
Individual Learning (Independent Practice and Application)
Time: 20 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
- Hand out “Individual Lateral Reading: Guiding Questions.”
- Students work individually to search for and evaluate sources of information for the “Hitler’s Diaries” case
- You can have students find their own sources OR provide them with some.
- Allowing students to find their own sources may be a more effective learning experience in trying to achieve the lesson objectives.
Closure
Time: 5-10 minutes
Teacher Does/Students Do:
Class discussion.
- What is something you noticed as you did your research today?
- What was something that was hard about your task?
- What was something you were proud of during today’s activity?
Hand out a sticky note or paper (could also do a google form):
- What is something you learned today about “lateral reading?”
- What is something you’re still wondering about “lateral reading?”
ASSESSMENTS
Formative Assessment
Content:
Language:
Plans for Summative Assessments
Content:
Language:
EXTENSIONS
Ideas for Key Assignments, Extensions, and Adaptations for Online Learning Environments: