1. Reliable vs. Unreliable Sources
Reliable Sources = TRUSTWORTHY SOURCES
Written by experts in that particular field
Unreliable Sources = SOURCES THAT CAN BE ALTERED BY ANYONE
sources, such as Wikipedia, are not reliable because the authors may not have a thorough knowledge or full understanding of a topic

2. Example of Reliable Sources
Book
Newspapers and magazines
Peer reviewed journals
Peer reviewed articles
PhD or MBA dissertations and research
Public library
Scholarly articles

3. How will I KNOW if its RELIABLE??
To determine reliability of online sites and organizations, look at the URL’s ending:
If the site ends in .edu, it is most likely a reliable educational institution.
If the site ends in .gov, it is most likely a reliable government website. These sites usually provide good sources for statistics and objective reports.
If the site ends in .org, it is usually a reliable non-profit organization.
News sources:
Every television and print news source has a website
Beware! Sometimes their focus is to entertain rather than inform**
WITH ANY SOURCE YOU MUST CHECK THE AUTHOR TO DETERMINE RELIABILITY

4. Examples of Unreliable Sources
Wikipedia: although this is a good starting point for finding initial ideas about a topic, some of their information and attached resources may not be reliable
Blogs, tweets
Personal websites
Forums
Sites created by organizations that may have political or biased agendas
Sites that provide biased information
Self-published sources
Opinionated articles such as editorials
Online sources with an URL that ends in html, which is the basic building blocks of web pages
Some online sources with an URL that end in .com are unreliable:
Sites of companies that conduct their business over the internet. Some of these sites are unreliable because they have hidden agendas.
THINK: are they trying to sell me something? A product? An idea?

5. Works Cited
You need FIVE citations in MLA format on your works cited page.
Your entries need to be in Alphabetical order based off of the first word in the entry
If the entry goes past the first line, you need to make a hanging indention. This is done by pressing “enter” and then “tab”
Hudson, Elizabeth. “Hanging Out with the Bats.” Texas
Highways August 1994; Pages

6. How to format entries… Book, one author:
Last name, First name. Title of Book. Place of Publication: Publishing
Company, year of publication.
WORKS CITED ENTRY EXAMPLE
Weinburg, Steven. Dreams of a Final Theory. New York: Pantheon, 1992.
PARENTHTICAL CITATION EXAMPLE:
One may see how “all logical arguments can be defeated by the simple refusal to reason logically”  (Weinburg 25).
Parenthetical citations are simply you stating where you found this information in the actual paper. Anything that did not come from your brain will have a parenthetical citation.

7. WORKS CITED ENTRY EXAMPLE:
How to format entries…
General Webpage:
Title of Page. Date page was published. Organization or Owner of Page. Date you accessed the page. <entire URL>
WORKS CITED ENTRY EXAMPLE:
Space Telescope Science Institute Home Page. 20 November, NASA. 28 October, 2004.
<
NOTE: If you are struggling to identify a page title, look at the internet tab at the top of your page.
PARENTHETICAL CITATION EXAMPLE:
Through ample research, one will discover how the goal of the Office of Public Outreach is to “[meet] the needs of the general public and science communicators by connecting to three user communities: news media, online audiences, and venues offering in-person interactions” (Space Telescope Science).
This should be the first word for few words in the Works Cited Entry, which will usually be the title of the page.

8. An article from an online database:
How to format entries…
An article from an online database:
Last name, first name. “Article Title.” Original Journal from Which it Came. Edition or Volume number. (Year of publication): Page numbers. Title of Database. Web. Access Date.
WORKS CITED ENTRY EXAMPLE:
Langhamer, Claire. “Love and Courtship in Mid-Twentieth-Century England.” Historical
Journal (2007): ProQuest. Web. 27 May, 2009.
PARENTHETICAL CITATION EXAMPLE:
(Langhamer 25)—If author not given, give the title of the article in quotation marks inside the parentheses.

9. WHAT YOU NEED IN LAB Google Scholar Destiny NC Wise Owl
PAY ATTENTION TO THE WEBSITES MRS. STRANGE SHOWS YOU
Scholarly, peer-reviewed articles and books

10. Work Cited
Austin Peay State University. “Reliable and Unreliable Sources”. Academic Support Center Writing Lab. Oct Web.