Week 11: Practical 6A
For this week's lab activity, we had to learn independently through e-learning. As such, we had to read and understand Lectures 6 and 7, and complete Lab Exercise 6a. To complete the exercise, we had to find two resources related to our assignment topic, and evaluate one of the resources. For the assignment, my group chose "Discuss the impact of drug abuse on youths".
Using http://www.google.com/ as my search facility, and the keywords "youth drug abuse", I found the Internet resource, InfoFacts – High School & Youth Trends. The url of the website is
The website is from the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) in the United States.
My overall impression of the website is that its well-organised, and is of sound quality. Being well-maintained, the information provided is useful for anyone interested in finding out about the impact of drug abuse on youths.
From this exercise, I have realised what is required to evaluate a website. Each and every website is different in many ways, for example in purpose, accuracy, coverage and presentation style. As such, it is necessary for anyone intending to use a website to first evaluate its usefulness to the task at hand. Should a person fail to do, he or she may end up with useless information.
Through this exercise, I have sharpened my skills in evaluating websites, and it is in my belief that these skills will help me in years to come.
