UW Media Course Final Project: Lateral Reading for any course
\n(adapted from COR curriculum Intro to lateral reading, level 2)
\nThis lesson will introduce students to lateral reading, a strategy for investigating a website or post by
\ngoing outside the site. Students watch the teacher model the strategy and then have a chance to practice
\nit in order to determine who is behind a website and, ultimately, whether that site is a trustworthy source
\nof information.
\nLesson Objective\/Student Target:
\nThe students will be able to…
\n\u25cf Define and apply lateral reading
\n\u25cb Lateral reading: the act of reading across multiple sources to verify information
\n\u25cf And answer the question: who is behind the information?
\nCCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.8
\nDelineate and evaluate the argument and specific claims in a text, assessing whether the reasoning is
\nvalid and the evidence is relevant and sufficient; identify false statements and fallacious reasoning.
\nSSS1.9-12.4
\nGather relevant information from multiple sources representing a wide range of views while using the
\norigin, authority, structure, context, and corroborative value of the sources to guide the selection.
\nSSS2.9-12.2
\nEvaluate the validity, reliability, and credibility of sources when researching an issue or event.
\nSSS2.9-12.3
\nDetermine the kinds of sources and relevant information that are helpful, taking into consideration
\nmultiple points of view represented in the sources, the types of sources available, and the potential uses
\nof the sources.
\nHealth Standard 3:
\nStudents will demonstrate the ability to access valid information and products and services to enhance
\nhealth.
\nMaterials:
\n\u25cf Link to \u201cArticle Evaluation\u201d task:
\nhttps:\/\/cor.stanford.edu\/curriculum\/assessments\/article-evaluation\/
\n\u25cf Modeling script
\n\u25cf Projector to display computer screen while modeling
\n\u25cf Computers for students (groups may share, if necessary)
\n\u25cf Link to or copies of Guiding Questions for students
\nPrerequisite Background Knowledge:
\nAsk students to consider any recent research they had to complete. Have them jot down on a post-it or
\nhalf-sheet of paper the ways in which they vetted the sources they used for that project – where did they
\nlook for information and how did they know it was a \u201cgood\u201d source?
\nHave students take a reliable\/not reliable questionnaire about the trustworthiness of different search
\nstrategies here.
\nTo fully engage with the examples in this lesson, students need to be familiar with the following topics
\n(based on your students\u2019 background knowledge, you may want to briefly review these at the beginning of
\nthe lesson):
\n\u25cf The concept of a minimum wage
\n\u25cf Who tends to support minimum wage increases (workers and liberals) and why
\n\u25cf Who tends to oppose minimum wage increases (businesses and conservatives) and why
\nLesson Summary:
\n1. Students complete task
\n2. Teacher models lateral reading to evaluate the same website
\n3. Students practice evaluating another website using lateral reading
\n4. Students discuss lateral reading and what they learned as a class
\nLesson Plan:
\n1. Students complete the \u201cArticle Evaluation\u201d task. Information about the task, a rubric, and sample
\nstudent responses are available here:
\nhttps:\/\/cor.stanford.edu\/curriculum\/assessments\/article-evaluation\/
\na. This task asks students to evaluate an article about the minimum wage and food prices in
\nDenmark that appears on minimumwage.com. Students must determine whether the
\narticle is a reliable source of information about the minimum wage. To successfully
\nevaluate the article, students must investigate the sponsor of minimumwage.com by going
\noutside the site itself. However, our experience piloting this task in real classrooms has
\nshown us that many students will not spontaneously do this.
\n2. Class Vote:
\na. After students complete the task, ask them to raise their hands (or use any other
\nmechanism for sharing out) to vote on their conclusions about the site\u2019s reliability. Possible
\nresponses include: \u201cDefinitely reliable,\u201d \u201cSomewhat reliable,\u201d \u201cNot at all reliable,\u201d and \u201cI\u2019m
\nnot sure.\u201d
\n\u25cf You may ask students to share the reasoning behind their evaluations of the
\nwebsite. It\u2019s okay if students share incorrect evaluations or surface
\nmisconceptions about online information at this stage. Later, in the next part of
\nthe lesson, you will model an effective approach to evaluating the website, so
\nthere\u2019s no need to correct students at this point.
\n3. Modeling:
\na. Model an evaluation of the website. A sample script is included at the end of the lesson
\nplan.
\nb. Note: This will be most effective if you are online and project your computer screen for
\nstudents to watch you as you model.
\n4. Debrief Modeling:
\na. Ask students:
\n\u25cf What did you notice me doing?
\n\u25cf Why was it important for me to look beyond the \u201cAbout\u201d page to find out about the
\norganization?
\n\u25cf Why should we adopt a skeptical attitude about what an unknown organization
\nwrites on its \u201cAbout\u201d page?
\n\u25cf How did my evaluation of the article compare to the one you wrote at the beginning
\nof class? What was similar? What was different?
\n\u25cf Why is lateral reading necessary to find out more about the sponsors of a website?
\nb. Ask students: What information do we need about an organization or author to help us
\ndecide if they are trustworthy as sources of information on a particular topic? Help students
\nconsider multiple aspects of a source:
\n\u25cf The sponsoring organization or author\u2019s perspective and why they might be
\nmotivated to present the information.
\n\u25cf How much expertise or authority they have on the topic and how committed they
\nare to providing trustworthy information. Aspects to consider when deciding
\nwhether an organization has authority include:
\n1. Whether its authors are trained as journalists (e.g., professional news outlets
\nor fact checking organizations) or have backgrounds in the specific subjects
\nthey\u2019re covering.
\n2. Whether the organization has processes in place to ensure the information
\nthey produce is factual and trustworthy (like editors, fact checkers, and
\nreview processes like peer review).
\n3. Whether the organization has systems in place to catch, correct, and admit
\nmistakes when they are made (like corrections sections).
\n4. Whether there are obvious conflicts of interest (e.g., a fossil fuel company
\nproviding information that downplays global warming).
\n5. Guided Practice:
\na. Watch Check Yourself with Lateral Reading: John Green’s Crash Course Navigating Digital
\nInformation #3 for students (13 min) and answer questions
\nb. Pass out \u201cLateral Reading Guiding Questions\u201d.
\nc. Have students work in pairs to evaluate the website
\nhttps:\/\/www.theodysseyonline.com\/why-we-should-raise-the-minimum-wage and
\nanswer the guiding questions. Pairs may share a device if necessary.
\n6. Share Out and Discuss:
\na. Pairs of students share what they learned about Odyssey Online as they read laterally.
\nb. Points to consider about the source:
\n\u25cf Odyssey Online is an online platform that crowdsources articles: writers submit
\narticles to be published on the site. According to a CNBC article in 2017, Odyssey is
\n\u201can expansive platform with 15,000 creators, most of them college students across
\nUS campuses.\u201d
\n\u25cf Because Odyssey does not follow standards of more traditional journalism outlets
\n(e.g., editors, fact checkers, corrections, etc.) and does not have procedures in
\nplace to ensure the quality of its articles, we cannot necessarily trust that this is a
\nreliable source of information on the minimum wage.
\n\u25cf Instead, this article may be seen as a single college student\u2019s views on the
\nminimum wage. Students could read the other linked articles and studies to check
\nif those are more reliable sources.
\nc. Final discussion question: Could you have learned this information about Odyssey Online if
\nyou stayed on the site itself?
\nd. If students do not address it directly, make sure they understand how much information
\nthey would have missed had they stayed on the site itself.
\ne. Remind students why prioritizing the question \u201cWho is behind this information?\u201d is so
\nimportant and why lateral reading is a powerful method of investigating online sources.
\nExit ticket – returning to the entry ticket reliability questionnaire, have students see what answers they
\nwould change. Also point out that our district\/school online databases are already verified.
\nResources:
\n\u25cf Sort Fact from Fiction Online with Lateral Reading – From Stanford History Education Center
\nfor teachers
\n\u25cf OER Commons: Lateral Reading II
\n\u25cf https:\/\/cor.stanford.edu\/curriculum\/lessons\/intro-to-lateral-reading\/
\n\u25cf Check Yourself with Lateral Reading: John Green’s Crash Course Navigating Digital
\nInformation #3 for students (13 min)
\nSample Modeling Script:
\nNote: This is not intended to be read verbatim. It is an example of how to model lateral reading. We
\nencourage teachers to use this as a starting place as they prepare to model this skill for their students.
\nIntroduction: Who is behind the information?
\n\u25cf I\u2019m trying to figure out if this article is a reliable source of information on the minimum wage. I\u2019m
\ngoing to share how I approached this problem. In the process, I will model asking the question,
\n\u201cWho is behind the information?\u201d (Reference the COR classroom poster if you have one). That\u2019s the
\nfirst question I ask when I land on a website I don\u2019t know.
\n\u25cf It\u2019s tempting to just dive into reading the information. But to quickly evaluate information, we need
\nto make the conscious decision to step back and ask who wrote the words and made the website
\nbefore we read it. That\u2019s the only way to figure out the authors\u2019 perspective, how much expertise
\nthey have on the minimum wage, and why they\u2019re presenting the information\u2014all aspects that go
\ninto deciding whether the article is reliable.
\n\u25cf The link in the task brought me to this article. Now, I\u2019m tempted to just start reading it, but I\u2019m
\ngoing to stop and first try to answer the most pressing question: Who\u2019s behind it? Who\u2019s saying
\nthis? What website am I on?
\n\u25cf It looks like this website is called minimumwage.com. So, I need to find out about the
\nminimumwage.com website. I\u2019d like to know more about the organization behind this, and since
\nthat\u2019s not really clear from this article page, I\u2019m going to click on the \u201cAbout\u201d page to see if it will
\ntell me the name of the person or organization who sponsors the website. Then I can investigate
\nthem. [Navigate to the \u201cAbout\u201d page and quickly read it aloud.]\nEmployment Policies Institute
\n\u25cf The first sentence answers my question about the organization that sponsors this site:
\n\u201cMinimumwage.com is a project of the Employment Policies Institute.\u201d
\n\u25cf The \u201cAbout\u201d page makes the organization sound pretty trustworthy: it says it is a non-profit,
\nnon-partisan research organization that sponsors research done at universities.
\n\u25cf But one thing I consider when I read an \u201cAbout\u201d page is that it\u2019s written by the people behind the
\nwebsite itself. There are many reasons to make themselves sound trustworthy\u2014to gain status,
\nfollowers, donations, etc. Would you say something bad about yourself or your company if you
\nwere writing an \u201cAbout\u201d page? Probably not.
\n\u25cf I know I need to go outside this website to see what other people say about minimumwage.com\u2019s
\nsponsoring organization, the Employment Policies Institute. That\u2019s called lateral reading because
\nI\u2019m going to open a new tab in my browser and search for the name of the organization to see
\nwhat other sources say about it.
\nLateral Reading
\n\u25cf To start my lateral reading, I\u2019m going to open a new tab and search for \u201cEmployment Policies
\nInstitute.\u201d
\n\u25cf Notice that I put the name of the organization in quotes. I\u2019m doing that so that Google searches
\nfor the three words as a unit, rather than finding any of the three words randomly on a web page.
\n\u25cf I\u2019m going to look carefully at the search results before I decide what to click on.
\n\u25cf I\u2019m scrolling past the Employment Policies Institute (EPI) pages because I\u2019m interested in
\ninformation from other people.
\n\u25cf As I scroll down the page a little further, I see this Salon article: \u201cCorporate America\u2019s new scam:
\nPR firm poses as a think tank.\u201d I\u2019m going to check out this article because it is from Salon, a news
\norganization I\u2019ve heard of (and if I want, can check it out on Wikipedia), and the headline makes it
\nsound like the article may give me important information about who\u2019s behind this organization.
\n\u25cf Quickly read or skim the first two paragraphs of the article. Focus on the following sentences,
\nstarting in the third paragraph: \u201cIn an Op-Ed he wrote for the Washington Post, his title was listed
\nas EPI\u2019s \u2018research director\u2019 but with a notation that EPI \u2018receives funding from restaurants, among
\nother sources.\u2019 But even this partial disclosure provides a disservice to readers in the nation\u2019s
\ncapital. In fact, the Employment Policies Institute operates from the same office suite as Berman
\nand Co., a public relations firm owned by Richard Berman.\u201d
\n\u25cf This makes me question whether I can trust EPI or minimumwage.com as a neutral or completely
\nreliable source on the minimum wage.
\nBerman
\n\u25cf Minimumwage.com is a site created by Richard Berman and Company, a public relations firm that
\nreceives funds from the restaurant and hotel lobbies. In general, businesses like restaurants and
\nhotels are against raising the minimum wage because they would make less money if they had to
\npay their workers more.
\n\u25cf This source probably has a strong perspective against raising the minimum wage and not a lot of
\nmotivation to present information that would make a minimum wage increase look like a good
\nthing. I\u2019m starting to question how reliable this source is for balanced information about minimum
\nwage policy.
\n\u25cf Before I completely trust this information about the Employment Policies Institute and
\nminimumwage.com, I need to remember that this is just one source. I need to seek out multiple,
\ntrustworthy accounts on a topic to gain a better understanding than relying on a single source.
\n\u25cf I have a couple of options here: I could keep reading the article and dig into evaluating the
\nevidence they provide about Berman and his PR firm. Or I could see if I find corroborating
\ninformation on minimumwage.com and Employment Policies Institute in other sources that I\u2019m
\nfamiliar with.
\n\u25cf Note: If you want to spend more time on this, you could continue your modeling by going back to the
\nsearch results and investigating what another source, like the New York Times, has to say on the
\ntopic.
\nRecap
\n\u25cf In trying to figure out who is behind the website minimumwage.com, not only did I have to check
\nits \u201cAbout\u201d page, but I had to read laterally\u2014to see what other sites said about the website I was
\ninvestigating.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UW Media Course Final Project: Lateral Reading for any course…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30473"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30475,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30473\/revisions\/30475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.frankwbaker.com\/mlc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}