Evaluating Websites

It is essential to know what makes a good website.
A good website will
-contain worthwhile content
-be easy to find your way around
-be kept up to date
It is difficult to talk about a typical website because they are all different based on the purpose and audience.

The best way is to make a checklist and make sure the website does not make some of the common mistakes.

You are required to make an evaluation checklist for a website
Produce a checklist for 20 things you should look in a website.
There are two ways of evaluating a website
-Self
-peer (a friend or classmate does it for you).
It is best using both the methods.
1. Some things to watch
2. Too many moving images
3. Long scrolling pages
4. Information that out of date
5. Long download times
6. Links that do not work

Tips on website creation
-Keep it simple
-Do not put music or sound
-Make it pleasing to the eye
-Do not put slow loading graphics on the page
-Make sure the important information is at the top of the screen
-Avoid the use of pop-ups

Reviewing School Websites

Most Schools now have websites. In this activity look at the websites listed below and find out
-Why school have websites
-What the main features of these websites are
- What makes a good school website?
Here are the sites to use
www.hitchams.suffolk.sch.uk/index.html
www.perse.cambs.sch.uk
atschool.eduweb.co.uk/heartihs/
atschool.edu.co.uk/sirwilf/index.htm
www.hamsteadschool.org.uk/
Our school
2 Schools in Mombasa
2 Schools in other parts of the country

What to consider when creating a website

When making documents to be used by others you need to consider who your audience will be.
Typical Audience include
Teenagers
Young parents
Males
Females
Senior citizens

Questions
1. In which of the above audiences would the size of the type used for the text be important.
2. If the site is to have lots of flash graphics with rap music which audience would be aimed at?
3. Which audience is more likely to be interested in cars and football?
4. Which audience is more likely to take a holiday outside school-holiday time?
5. Which audience is most likely to be interested in a site on cosmetics?

Expectation of Website

When you log onto a website, you have certain expectation about the site. Your experience of looking at websites has given you the expectations. When you design a website it important to meet your audience’s expectations.

Task 1
You are now required to thoroughly investigate the official website for singer Britney Spears at www.britneyspears.com
On the website for a pop star you might expect certain things.
Complete the following table by writing in the left column what you would like to see and in the right column state weather or not the site contained it

What I would expect to see Did the website contain it?


Task 2
Using the same website, fill in the following table by saying what you liked and disliked about the site

What I liked about the site What I did not like about the site



Task 3
You are an up coming pop star so it is time you had your own website. Write a list of features that you would include in your website. For each feature write a sentence to explain it would be useful.

Two things that you need to consider when creating a website is Audience and Purpose

INVESTIGATING WEBSITES

For this activity you are required to investigate certain websites. For each website you have to answer the questions that follow

• The NASA website: www.nasa.gov/home/index.html
• The McLaren racing car website: www.mclaren.co.uk
• An official website on the footballer David Beckham: http://www.davidbeckham.com/
• The Pop Idol website: http://www.popidolwatch.co.uk/
• CD-WOW – a company that sells CDs on the internet: www.cd-wow.com

1. Who is the intended audience for this website?

2. How do you know?

3. What are the main features of this website?

4. Which of the following things is it possible to do on the website?
a. download a file
b. play music
c. watch a video clip
d. play a game
e. buy goods online
f. search the site for specific information
g. obtain photographs
h. find out the news
i. find out the weather

5. Give the website a rating of one to five (one being worst and five being best)

(Keyed in by Keshni Haria)

Comparing a website with a book

In this activity you will compare a website with a book to find certain information.
1. first look up the following words in a paper dictionary:
Access
Audience
Evaluate
Think about how you performed the task

2. Now look up the same words using an on-line dictionary at
www.dictionary.cambridge.org/

Think about how you performed this task.

3. Write a few sentences to explain the difference in the two task.
Which way was easier, and which did you prefer and why?