First-Year Writing Research Guide

Evaluating sources in both your academic and personal lives is very practical skill. With practice, you can learn to critically evaluate every source and website you come across quickly and efficiently. The rubrics below will give you questions to think about when looking at sources. 

Read closely. Question sources that contain:

• Claims that cannot be verified through other means
• Biased or inflammatory language
• Dead or self-referential links
• No information about the author, especially if the corporate author is unknown or untrustworthy

Practice evaluating source material using the tutorial below.

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