Tom Wells, history-ontheweb Project Manager, comments and guides

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If, when you stood on the sea shore, you heard that a tidal wave was expected, you would want to ensure you were not swept helplessly away. The worldwide web can be likened to a tidal wave, in this case a tidal wave of information. Serious surfers need to find a way to avoid being swamped and damaged by information.

The first main issue is the Internet surfer’s response to pages accessed on the web. Surfing can be exciting but that does not validate copy found on it. Students should use the discriminatory skills they learned to exercise with documents at GCSE. Is the author of web copy known? If known, is she/he in a position, by way of study and expertise, to write reliable copy? Can the reason for the publication of copy on the web be identified? Even if the writer is well qualified to write good copy, is there evidence of bias and prejudice? David Irving was well informed on Nazi Germany but barely one historian accepts all his conclusions. 

Imagine going to one of Britain’s five copyright libraries. These are libraries in which, by law, all copyright publications must be deposited. My nearest, Cambridge University Library, has some seven floors in six wings, not to mention the main tower block. Throughout, there are tightly packed shelves with narrow aisles. New assistants would be well advised to have a quick course in Theseus escapism before they venture into the labyrinth. And yet the library works, and it works because all books are classified and numbered and there is a central index. The www has no central index. However, gateway sites, such as that developed by the University of Strathclyde (http://link.bubl.ac.uk/history) are being created. GCSE students make find www.sfe.co.uk/resources/linkbank with its grading system particularly useful. Teachers and students are advised to keep lists of helpful sites. On history-ontheweb pages, the ‘Selected links to Internet History sites’ is the section that will be greatly developed over the next months.

Web use will develop new skills. These include effective searching, rapid assessment of academic level and usefulness of pages to a study task and not so much skim reading as on screen scanning. Articles on history-ontheweb are purposely in a column to help this. Should students be encouraged to surf the web with their history study? My answer is yes, in their own time, as long as they embrace the cautions in earlier paragraphs. They will, thereby, develop skills that will be used in later study and in many occupations when they begin their careers.

Postscript. The ‘Internet for Historians’ has been written for advanced History students by Frances Condron and Grazyna Cooper, Oxford University Computing Services, and can be reached through www.rdg.ac.uk/History/. Once on that home page click on Internet for Historians where you will find four main sections, tour, discover, review and reflect. The more able and ambitious KS4 pupils could gain from having a look at the guide.