Today you will
- check whether a website can be trusted
- check an AI answer against a real source
- start your Research Page
Your Research Page is a document of checked facts about your Something Real project, each with the link where you found it.
Have you ever believed a "fact" online that turned out to be wrong? What made you believe it?
The CRAAP test is five quick checks on any source:
| Letter | What it checks | The question to ask |
|---|---|---|
| C | Currency | How recent is it? |
| R | Relevance | Does it apply to you? |
| A | Authority | Who wrote it? |
| A | Accuracy | Can you check it elsewhere? |
| P | Purpose | Why does the page exist? |
A hallucination is when an AI makes up a fact or a source and sounds sure of it.
Using AI honestly means it helps with your own work. Passing off its words as yours is dishonest.
A good source is one you can check, not one with a fancy address.
Example entry
You will fill in the two gaps yourself later in this lesson.
Claim: The national minimum wage in Ireland is €[the rate you find] an hour.
Source: [the web address of the page you checked]
Why I trust this: Citizens Information is an official public service. I checked it today, and gov.ie gives the same rate.
Rank these four sources by trust, then read the checks.
The four sources
- A dietitian's blog from this year says eggs in moderation are fine. It links two studies and shows she is a registered dietitian.
- A slick news site says Wi-Fi cuts teenagers' concentration by 30%. It has no author, no study and 14,000 shares.
- A Revenue page on the tax rate, updated this year.
- ChatGPT tells you the minimum wage for a 19-year-old "as of 2024".
Write your ranking, 1 for most trusted and 4 for least, then open the checks.
Open the checks
- Blog: trust it. It has a named expert, sources and a date.
- News site: don't trust it. Looking polished doesn't make it true.
- Revenue: trust it. It is official and current.
- ChatGPT: check it first. AI can be out of date or just wrong.
Where was your gut wrong?
You will check one practice claim about pay, then see what an AI says about the same thing. Follow the steps in the box below.
Here is the claim to check:
You will type this entry into your page:
Claim: The national minimum wage in Ireland is €[the rate you found] an hour.
Source: [paste the Citizens Information web address]
Why I trust this: Citizens Information is an official public service. I checked it today, and gov.ie gives the same rate.
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