3rd on the list when a google search is done for Martin Luther King Jr., is a website with the URL www.martinlutherking.org. Unfortunately, this website is really crappy and something that students should absolutely not be exposed to. First of all, evaluating the website for reliability reveals the following findings. No author of the website could be found. Neither could I find a publisher or the last time the website was updated. I did discover that the discussion board on this website was hosted by stormfront.org, which’s slogan is “white pride, world wide.” Likewise, the content is not public service organized unless you consider spreading hate, racism, and division a public service. These are not content standards that I’m going to use in a my classroom, that’s for sure. Furthermore, this site uses explicatives and invokes brutal images with words. The design is not awful. It’s easy to navigate, but some of the links do not work. I see this site as having no relevance in my classroom because of the vulgarity of some of the content and the utter ridiculousness of other aspects of it. However, with websites out there like this, which come up 3rd on google searches, students do need to be able to discrimante between reliable and unreliable sources. I would use a less inflammatory site to teach this though by teaching students tools of discrimination such as looking for author authority, affiliations with reliable organizations, looking at the purpose of the content, and the design of the website.
I’m really pretty horrified that this awful site came up 3rd on the google search, but I’m guessing it happened because all three of the search words are in its title and URL. Additionally, the description reads, “includes historical trivia, articles, and pictures. A valuable source for teachers and students alike.” This is a very deceitful description, and I don’t think most unreliable sources come up quite as high on the google search list, but regardless, this assignment has brought home the importance of teaching students to be critical thinkers, especially on the internet.