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9th grade · English Language Arts · Unit 10 of 12

Research & Credibility

Peer review, AI output and synthesis

What your child practices

Students practice effective research questions, peer review, conflicting sources, sampling, lateral reading, checking AI output for invented sources, and citing and synthesizing evidence honestly.

Minnesota K-12 Academic Standards benchmark: 9.2.7.2; 9.1.9.2 · research from many sources and judging their credibility

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. Use peer-reviewed sources when you can, and ask who funded a study.
  2. Read laterally: check what other reliable sources say. AI tools can invent sources and facts.
  3. Correlation is not causation: two things happening together doesn’t prove one causes the other.

Example: Ice cream sales and sunburns both rise in summer. Does ice cream cause sunburns? They happen at the same time. Both are caused by something else: hot, sunny weather. Answer: No: correlation does not prove causation.

Research & Credibility in Minnesota

In the Minnesota K-12 Academic Standards, this is unit 10 of 12 in 9th grade English Language Arts, after Form & Composing and before Proofreading.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: Minnesota Department of Education (MDE)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Which source is generally most credible for a scientific claim?

    • a viral video
    • a peer-reviewed journal article
    • an anonymous blog
    • a product website

  2. Question 2

    Which detail shows a website may be imitating a real news site?

    • a clear author name
    • a slightly misspelled web address
    • a contact page
    • a correction policy

  3. Question 3

    What is a credible author?

    • someone who writes long posts
    • someone with many followers
    • someone who agrees with you
    • someone with relevant expertise and a record of accuracy

  4. Question 4

    What is lateral reading?

    • reading sideways
    • skimming headings
    • checking what other reliable sources say about a source
    • reading every word of one page

  5. Question 5

    Which is the strongest way to use a statistic in an essay?

    • give the number, its source and why it matters
    • put it in the title
    • round it up to sound bigger
    • state the number alone

  6. Question 6

    An AI chatbot provides a convincing paragraph with a citation to a real journal, but the article doesn't exist. This is called a…

    • paraphrase
    • peer review
    • primary source
    • hallucinated or fabricated citation

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