It may surprise some readers to learn that research-based projects can begin as early as grades K–2. The student just mentioned lives in Florida and formerly attended school in Texas, which is my rationale for considering those states in what follows. How do you make parents aware that their children will be doing internet research and that their children’s “online safety” has been considered?.Are they provided a checklist/rubric for how projects would be graded?.What guidelines/templates are students provided for developing their projects?.
Is there a standards document indicating skills that students should be developing in elementary grades for using technology to conduct research?. How is the research process introduced to elementary students, particularly for using the internet? Are learners provided an age-appropriate online tutorial?. I also sought input from the teacher via e-mail. Researchers (Anderson, 2012) have found the overall readability of numerous Wikipedia articles too difficult for many readers. The reading level was too advanced for a typical third-grader. My concern was not just about the credibility of using Wikipedia for academic purposes. Wikipedia articles often come up first in search engines and even might appear first when using safe search sites for kids, as I discovered using KidRex, a child-safe search tool. What had the children learned about conducting research-based projects? Why was a third-grader using Wikipedia? Did the students have a list of safe sites to use for their research, appropriate for their grade level? Later, I easily found information about American alligators in Wikipedia using Google, as the student had done. This was an authentic project, as she had selected this topic because she often sees an alligator in the waterway behind her home. She did not know if she would be presenting the project to her classmates. When she said that she got her information from Wikipedia, I suggested that she might wish to include her source on the project, but she did not want to. 
She and her mom were proud that she had done her own research. She had included several interesting facts and her own drawing of an alligator on a poster. Recently, I had a brief discussion with a third-grader who was working on a science project on American alligators.
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