In a study conducted across an urban school district, we tested a classroom-based intervention in which students were taught online evaluation strategies drawn from research with professional fact checkers. Students practiced the heuristic of "lateral reading": leaving an unfamiliar website to search the open Web before investing…

This study investigated how high school students evaluated online information on social and political topics. Eighteen juniors and seniors, at a school that attempts to leverage technology to personalize learning, thought aloud as they completed online reasoning tasks. Three themes emerged from analyses of think-aloud data. First, students…

This study investigated an approach to teaching students to evaluate online information in the context of a high school history class. Over the course of a semester, I collaborated with a teacher to teach and refine a series of eight lessons focused on "civic online reasoning." We aimed to use students' historical reading as a bridge to…

Prior research suggests that high school students often struggle to evaluate online content; however, with support, they can learn to conduct more effective digital evaluations. This study extends our understanding of how students attend to the source of online information and the role instruction may play in changing students' evaluation of…