Evaluating Sources Using the CRAAP and BEAM Methods
l though you may have seen this presentation before in another topic, it is worth watching and listening to again as the lessons are important for all aspects of college writing and academic research.
This presentation discusses two evaluation and organizing concepts you can use when you start to research in ENG 1201 online.
- The first method is called CRAAP, which is an acronym that stands for Currency, Relevance, Authority, Accuracy, and Purpose. CRAAP will help you evaluate the credibility of sources that you discover in your research efforts.
- The second method is the BEAM organizing method. BEAM will help you decide which of your gathered sources you should use in your research paper.
Both of these methods involve choosing and categorizing sources. The accuracy and depth of your research writing depend on how well you use these methods. The presentation that follows will walk you through both methods.
Click on the following link to view a video on Evaluating Sources using the CRAAP and BEAM Methods
Determining the Validity and Reliability of Online Sources
Academic writers use sources to enlarge and refine their ideas and to support and validate their claims. These sources can include facts, opinions, the ideas of others, and they can be found in print or digitally, in the form of books, articles, lectures, reports, reviews, and interviews.
Most of the research you will be using for your research paper for this course will be found in the library databases that you learned about earlier in this course. However, you might also be tempted to use Google or another search engine to look for websites you can use for your research project.
While there is much worth knowing that you might access via the internet, there is even more information that is not worth the pixels used to post it. Below you will find two videos that review what you learned watching the CRAAP and BEAM presentations and take those concepts a bit farther. Click on the links below to access two videos and the CRAAP Test Worksheet. Be sure to watch BOTH videos. Each video provides unique information that will help you choose the best sources for your research.
- The first video, Evaluating Web Sources, shows why it can be tricky finding good sources on the Internet.
- The second video, Evaluating Web Sites, provides additional information that will help you find reliable sites.
- Click the link: CRAAP Test Worksheet for determining whether a website is credible and reliable.
