For children, there is no higher power than the internet. It is the end all be all for all of their needs. Gone are the days of going to the library and flipping open a book and you can forget about Grandpa and his sage advice. You yourself are reading this article which is only available online. Playing a game, getting food, listening to music, ordering paper towels; all done with the internet. Unfortunately, as Peter Parker learned from Uncle Ben, “With great power, comes great responsibility.” Students are so highly dependent on the internet but they often do not have the skills to be able to make the most out of their experiences. As we all know from browsing social media, there is a lot of garbage unreliable information on the internet that readers need to know how to sift through in order to reap the benefits of its almighty power.
As a teacher, you are probably asking yourself, “Where do I even begin?” My hope is by the end of this article you can walk away having a greater understanding of online comprehension and the skills students need. Though I came in hot speaking mostly of reliability, there are actually 4 components that make up the online comprehension framework that teachers need to consider.
- Locate
- Evaluate
- Synthesize
- Communicate
Locate
The first skill that students need is to be able to locate the information they need. This is not challenging when students are trying to find an answer to a basic question because they are great at being able to “Google it.” But when students need to find information about a topic they often struggle. When students have complex research questions, they can no longer just use google to get an answer. They need to know how to locate information that will help them build a better understanding of their topic. Students need to be able to “use appropriate keywords in a search engine, efficiently read search results, and identify websites with information that can be used to solve the information problem scenario.” (Neag School of Education ORCA, 2015) By being able to locate information, students will be well on their way to demonstrating strong online comprehension.
Evaluate
Once students are able to find the information online we now need them to be able to evaluate the information. With so many people contributing to the information on the internet, it can be really difficult to sort through what is true and what is unsubstantiated. Wikis, websites, social media, (cough) blogs (cough); these are all great sources of information but how do we know which are reliable. Companies and advertisers are getting much more creative as well and often now disguise their ads which are referred to as “native advertising.” “By definition, native advertising tries to sell or promote a product in the guise of a news story. Native advertising makes it difficult for unsuspecting readers to know if and when there is an ulterior motive behind the information they encounter.” (Stanford History Education Group, 2016) Entire “news articles” are really just an advertisement for whatever a vendor might be selling. The students are going to need to be better than ever at determining the source of the information they find. Students will need to be able to “identify a website’s author and evaluate his/her level of expertise, consider the author’s point of view, and evaluate the reliability of author claims and evidence related to the problem scenario.” (Neag School of Education ORCA, 2015) This is a crucial skill to ensure that students are accessing reliable information.
Synthesize
When students are researching complex questions, they often can’t find the answer from 1 google search. To the student's dismay, they need to find bits and pieces and then be able to combine or synthesize the information to come up with an understanding of the topic. Students need to “require students to integrate (across multiple claims within one website) and intertextually (across multiple websites) in their own words, take a position on the issues involved, and use evidence from multiple online sources to support their thinking.” (Neag School of Education ORCA, 2015) For elementary students, finding the main idea of one article can be challenging. Being able to do this with multiple articles and then combine the information is hard but important work.
Communicate
Once students have built their new understanding of a topic, it is important that they are then able to share their findings with others. They can do this in a number of ways from email, wikis to messenger services such as hangouts, Facebook Messenger, etc. We want students to be clear in their response and make sure that they can convey the important information in an appropriate way. Students need to “require students to compose and either send or post a short report of information they have learned about the scenario in an appropriately crafted, visually organized and clear message.” (Neag School of Education ORCA, 2015) This is an important skill, especially as we think about preparing students for future careers where communication is so important.
So now that you know the components of online comprehension I am sure you are wondering how to identify students strengths and weaknesses in these areas. Lucky we have the Online Reading Comprehension Assessment or ORCA. “The Online Reading Comprehension Assessment (ORCA) Project, funded by the U.S. Department of Education, is designed to develop, test, and refine a set of three assessment formats for measuring online reading comprehension.” (Neag School of Education ORCA, 2015) The assessment was created by Dr. Donald Leu and his colleagues because he realized the need to be able to assess students for those key 21st-century skills. Students take this assessment on the computer where they are given an authentic research experience. When students sign into the assessment, they are presented with a question that they need to research. Students communicate with a “classmate” through a chat software that helps lead them through a series of tasks. Through these tasks, students are asked to demonstrate their online comprehension skills. You will see students completing all different types of authentic tasks such as finding websites, summarizing information, making connections between different sources and composing emails.
Once the student completes the task, scores are recorded so that the teacher can evaluate the student's strengths and weaknesses. The assessment has some self-scoring aspects as well as a quick score rubric that teachers can use to get results fast. The teacher uses binary scoring to either say if the student specifically completed a task or not. Once the teacher finishes scoring the ORCA they will have a greater understanding of what online comprehension abilities the student holds.
The ORCA is unlike any reading comprehension assessment I have ever seen. For the first time, I was looking at an assessment that was created with Online Comprehension at the forefront. Gone are the #2 pencil and bubble sheets. This assessment is designed with the future of learning and education in mind which I think all teachers will appreciate. So what is next? If you want ideas of how to teach into these different aspects of online comprehension be sure to read my colleague Christal’s article “PST + iC framework” to enhance online literacy skills.
References
Neag School of Education ORCA. (2015). Retrieved March 02, 2018, from http://www.orca.uconn.edu/
Stanford History Education Group (November 22, 2016). Evaluating information: The cornerstone of civic responsibility. In your folder and available at: https://sheg.stanford.edu/upload/V3LessonPlans/Executive%20Summary%2011.21.16.pdf
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