The Internet connects us with a wealth of information on countless topics contributed by people throughout the world.

To help us, we will explore the use of the mnemonic device,  RADCAB. RADCAB is an east way to help you evaluate the information you find on search engines like Bing, Yahoo and Google.   “RADCAB” ™  is a mnemonic acronym for information evaluation created by Karen Christensson in 2002, while designing a lesson for her students on the importance of evaluation information sources. Basically, when evaluating a website students should consider: relevancy, appropriateness, detail, currency, authority and bias. Karen Chistiensson recently developed a  RADCAB Rubric  to aid students with the evaluation process.

This video below was posted February 4, 2011 on CNN News , however, The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus is an internet hoax site that has been around since 1998.  Lyle Zapato created the site, a Washington based author and web publisher. Mr. Zapato went as far as to give the creature a scientific name Octopus paxarbolis, which means ‘octopus of the Pacific tree’.

This site has been used over the years to test the Internet literacy of people and it is not a big surprise that a large number of people who looked at the site believed it to be true.Teaching you, the student how to evaluate websites is an important skill. My favorite method for teaching website evaluation is RADCAB. Watch the tree Octopus video below.

Hail a RADCAB to guide you through the gridlock of the internet.

Use this rubric to find out how you score as a R.A.D.C.A.B evaluator. Evaluate the Tree Octopus  website. What are two red flags that tell you the website is not credible?