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50 min
Student Lesson
Lesson 28: Gathering and Evaluating Sources
Content
Students will gather and evaluate credible and accurate sources that directly address their inquiry questions.
Language
Students will explain source credibility and relevance using attribution syntax, appositive phrases, and comparison language.
How do different disciplines and traditions, including scientific inquiry and cultural knowledge, help us understand our relationship to the natural world?
Knowledge-Building:
Students move from generating inquiry questions to gathering and evaluating sources that show different perspectives on their research topic.
Enduring Understanding:
When knowledge is shared across generations and worldviews, it can restore balance between people and the planet.
Future Lessons:
In Lesson 29, students will evaluate source usefulness. In Lesson 30, students will learn how to take notes on their research.
Unit Performance Task:
Students need credible, relevant, and varied sources to create effective research-based presentations for the Performance Task.
| Lesson Flow | Purpose of Learning Experience |
|---|---|
Launch5 Minutes | Students reflect on how their inquiry questions can help them find information for their research. |
Literacy Lab10 Minutes | Students learn how to gather and evaluate sources for credibility and accuracy. |
Learning in Action30 Minutes | Part A: Gather and Evaluate Sources (W.8.8) Students gather and evaluate potential sources for their inquiry questions. Part B: Determine Strongest Sources and Refine Inquiry Questions (W.8.7, W.8.8) Students identify their strongest sources and refine their inquiry questions. |
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Material List
Unit 3 Lesson 28 Student Edition
Teacher-selected research sources aligned to the model research topic
Routines
Think-Pair-Share
Turn and Talk
Quick Write
Students use their inquiry questions to find credible sources of information for their research topic.
Have students take out their inquiry questions from Lesson 27.
Say these Directions: Take out the inquiry questions you refined in the previous lesson. First, think silently about how those questions can guide your search for information. Then, turn to your partner and explain which words in your questions will help you search for sources and which words might need to be changed.
Ask students to discuss the following question.
Ask: How will you use your inquiry questions to find information about your topic?
(Student responses may vary.) I will use the most important words from my inquiry question as search terms. If my question is about seed sharing, I would search for “Indigenous seed sharing California” instead of just “seeds.” Then I will check if the source clearly answers my question by looking for specific ideas or examples. For example, if the source explains how seed sharing supports relationships between people and the land, I know it is relevant.
Say: Now that you have generated inquiry questions to guide your research, you are ready to learn how researchers decide which sources are worthy of further exploration.
Say: Today, you will learn how to find and evaluate sources using your inquiry questions and search terms. As you gather sources, you may refine or remove some of your inquiry questions; this is part of the research process. By the end of the lesson, you will work toward one strong, overarching inquiry question to guide your research.
Say these Directions: Today, you will track and evaluate sources using a table in your journal. Copy the table into your journal.
Display the following table for students to copy into their journals.
Source Title and Author | Source Description | Which Inquiry Question Does This Source Address? | Why Might This Source Be Useful? |
|---|---|---|---|
Demonstrate how to gather sources and then evaluate them for credibility and accuracy.
Display the following Model Inquiry Question.
Inquiry Question: How did Indigenous peoples use fire to manage forests and to restore the land?
Display the following definitions for students.
credibility: the degree to which a source of information is considered trustworthy or an expert on the topic
accuracy: the extent to which information is correct, supported by evidence, and up-to-date
. Think aloud to complete the chart for the model inquiry question.
Say: The first step is to record the source title and author. I will write that in the first column.
Say: The second step is to write a brief description of the source so I understand what it is mostly about.
Say: The third step is to identify which inquiry question this source helps answer.
Say: The fourth step is to evaluate whether the source is credible. I ask: Who wrote this? What is their relationship to the topic? Is this a source I can trust?
Say: The fifth step is to evaluate whether the source is accurate. I look for evidence, data, and whether the information seems current and correct.
Say: I do not trust a source just because it matches my topic. I check the author and the publisher first. Then I look for clear examples or evidence to decide if it is accurate. A source can be about my topic but still not be useful if it does not clearly answer my question.
Find an article to evaluate for source credibility and accuracy. Display and use these questions to model how to evaluate the selected article for credibility and accuracy.
Say these Directions: Observe how I evaluate a source for credibility and accuracy using the following questions.
Evaluating Source Credibility and Accuracy
Who wrote the source? What is their relationship to the topic?
Is it from a credible publisher or website? Is it current?
Does it include evidence or data that can be checked and/or verified?
Is the source mostly free from errors?
Say these Directions: When you begin your own research, follow these steps:
Record the source title and author.
Write a brief description of the source.
Identify which inquiry question the source helps answer.
Evaluate whether the source is credible and accurate.
Explain why the source is useful for your research.
Teacher Tip |
|---|
As you model, think aloud about how you decide whether a source is credible and useful. Students may assume that any source related to their topic is helpful. Explicitly show how you reject or question a source that seems relevant but does not clearly answer your inquiry question. If needed, model a quick comparison between two sources and explain why one is more useful than the other. |
Say: Now you will gather and evaluate sources that clearly connect to your inquiry questions.
Students work independently to gather and evaluate sources for their inquiry questions.
Say these Directions: Use your inquiry questions and search terms from Lesson 27 to find and evaluate potential sources for research. As you gather sources, record your thinking in the table in your journal. Follow the same steps we just practiced together.
Source Title and Author | Source Description | Which Inquiry Question Does This Source Address? | Why Might This Source Be Useful? |
|---|---|---|---|
Provide time for students to work independently. Circulate and confer briefly with each student by focusing on source choice, use of credibility and accuracy evaluation, and alignment to inquiry questions. If students finish early, encourage them to find an additional source or revise their inquiry questions based on what they are learning.
Use these brief Research Reflection Prompts as you confer:
What new information did you learn today?
What new inquiry questions arose from today’s work?
What changes do you need to make to your process?
What are your next steps?
Teacher Tip |
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If needed, use any of the following questions to help students gather and evaluate sources for their research.
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Provide students with a confidence continuum (i.e., 1–5). As needed, model how to demonstrate a level of confidence using the continuum.
Reflection |
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Reflect on your ability to evaluate a source for credibility and accuracy using the Reflection routine.
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Transition students into partners and have them review their completed table entries. Remind students to focus on sources that both are credible and clearly answer their inquiry questions.
Say these Directions: Review the sources you gathered and circle 5–6 sources that seem most useful and credible. Then discuss with your partner and explain how these sources are changing your thinking about your research topic. Decide whether any inquiry questions should be kept, revised, deleted, or added based on the sources found. Before we finish, circle the inquiry question that seems most overarching or central to your research topic right now.
Provide time for students to circle their 5–6 most useful and credible sources, and then have students discuss with their partners how their inquiry questions are changing based on their research.
Ask partners to discuss the following questions.
Say these Directions: Discuss the following questions with a partner.
Ask: How are these sources making you think differently about your current inquiry questions? Are there any questions to add, delete, or revise?
(Student responses may vary.) These sources show me that my topic is broader than I first thought. Many of them focus on how communities protect ecosystems, not just one practice. I may need to revise my question to focus on a specific ecosystem.
Ask: Which inquiry question seems most overarching or central to your research right now? Why?
(Student responses may vary.) My overarching inquiry question is “How can Indigenous knowledge and modern science work together to restore ecosystems?” It is overarching because several sources connect to this idea, even when they focus on different details.
Students reflect on their research work during this lesson.
Say these Directions: Use the following directions to complete your Quick Write.
Quick Write Response Directions:
Star two sources in your table. For each source:
Explain why each source is credible, accurate, and useful.
Explain how the two sources might interpret your topic differently.
(Student responses may vary.) One of my sources is “Reviving Cultural Fire Practices” from the Karuk Tribe fire management department. It is credible because it comes from a named tribal organization directly connected to land stewardship. It is useful because it explains how cultural burning is used to restore oak woodlands and reduce fuel buildup.
My second source is a university extension article on oak woodland health. It is credible because it is written by a named ecologist and includes data on how low-intensity fires improve forest conditions. Both sources address cultural burning; however, one focuses on community knowledge and stewardship while the other focuses on measured ecological effects.
Instruct students to review their inquiry questions and select the one that is most central to their research topic.
In their Journal, have students copy the selected inquiry question and write 2–3 sentences explaining why it will guide the rest of their research.
Decide which of your inquiry questions is the most overarching or central to your research of all your inquiry questions. In your Journal, copy that question and write 2–3 sentences explaining why it can guide the rest of your research.