Grade 4 - 5
General Science Education
Evaluation of a website used for Education (Science):
Website being Evaluated: https://kids.frontiersin.org/
Currency:
Articles are published to the site, which is regularly updated by both teachers and students every few days.
Though testing was not incredibly thorough, at the very least all of the links on the home page work and have been updated since the advent of the new year.
Relevance:
The website is designed to cover a broad range of science subjects while still using understandable language and cues for children aged 10 - 13. It is perfect for a 4th - 5th grade environment.
The audience is the students, which allows for extra relatability since the articles are written by children.
The information provided is appropriate for all ages and the user interface can be navigated and understood easily.
Authority:
The authors for the individual articles are usually children, whose essays / articles were either selected or volunteered for the site. In terms of overhead, it is run by the Frontier research foundation, a longtime tried and true supporter of STEM education for children.
Since most of the articles are written by children, for children, there are few credentials to list in the first place.
Accuracy:
The information appears to go through an editor before publishing, allowing for any writing errors to be corrected before posting to the site.
The information being posted all appears to be elementary science, and though the understanding of the material may be limited, all of it appears to be based in science.
References are provided at the bottom of each article.
Purpose:
The information provided is demonstrated as factual, and if opinions are given, they are specified as such.
The information provided is primary.
There are absolutely many sponsors of the site, with many donors understanding how important it is to encourage STEM education for youth at a critical turning point of their lives.
Little exaggerated language is used outside of the occasional childish humor.
Bias
Because the authors of the individual pages are mostly children, there is a sense of honesty in place towards the provision of facts.
Most of the pieces on the site are fact based, not opinion based.
Design
Page has an endearing design, with polished clip art of science tools and scientists, interesting topics, and a bright home website.
The design contributes to its easy to understand nature, allowing for more focus on the subjects that confuse the students.
Technical Element
The page isn't too technical for the purpose of simplicity, but this is not to say that the page itself is out of date. Simply, it feels that more focus should be put on the facts being presented rather than being technologically advanced.