The cupcake connection
Starting in 3rd grade, kids are introduced to the information and cupcakes idea. Would they rather eat a cupcake in a bakery (even if it costs money) or eat a cupcake found on a bench near their house? Most kids (--though not all :)!--) say that they would prefer the bakery cupcake, for lots of good reasons. I teach the kids that getting their information from Google and other search engines and online platforms (especially social media platforms) is like eating the bench cupcake; it's hard to be confident about the quality of the information. I encourage them to take advantage of what I call information bakeries, the digital resources written and edited by professionals that we have access to through school, district, and state subscriptions. These digital subscriptions, along with print books, are the best places to go for research for their school projects.
As kids get older and build on their research skills, we explore more nuanced ways to decide whether or not other kinds of sources are trustworthy. If you have thoughts or questions about the information and cupcakes analogy, I would welcome them. Here's my contact info.
How to help your child with their research project
Our "information bakeries" (digital subscriptions) can be accessed through the slides on our student research page. Note that as the slides progress, the general reading difficulty of each resource gets harder. Also note that user names and passwords are included along with links. Your child will need these user names and passwords to access the subscription when they're not at school.
Some classes may have additional resources provided to them for a specific project. You can check our library lessons page to see if there are other links, tools or instructions that I've used while working with your child's class on this project.
Ways that you can help as your child gets started with their research:
ask your child if they can comfortably read the information on their own. Have them read part of it out loud to you. If they're really having a hard time with text difficulty, it may be helpful for you to read part of the information out loud with them.
ask your child questions like
what's the most important idea?
what surprised you?
what was new information for you? what did you already know?
was there anything that you thought that you knew, but were wrong about?
have your child write down notes (preferably with pencil and paper) on what they remember from their reading without looking at the source. This may be hard and frustrating for many kids, as it will require them to recall information and put it into their own words, but it's an important habit to establish when doing research.
Many children find the information-gathering process difficult. It may take time and persistence to find information that's useful to them, and then there's the hard work of integrating what they're learning and putting it into their own words. As much as possible, allow them to struggle with this part.