User:Momoberk/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
(Provide a link to the article here.)


 * 1) Literacy in the United States
 * 2) Adolescent literacy

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
(Briefly explain why you chose it, why it matters, and what your preliminary impression of it was.)


 * 1) I choose this article to evaluate because it covers the area I am focussed on in my sector debates and research. For this class I have been focusing on high poverty elementary school literacy rates in the United States, and this article provides insight into the history and debates of the area of literacy I am focused on.
 * 2) I choose the article on adolescent literacy as my sector article because it works well with my other assignments with my sector being illiteracy in elementary schools. This article is also quite short and does not have much detail or sections in it, so it will be a good article to add to or edit with future assignments.

Evaluate the article
(Compose a detailed evaluation of the article here, considering each of the key aspects listed above. Consider the guiding questions, and check out the examples of what a useful Wikipedia article evaluation looks like.)


 * 1) The lead section provides a brief and concise compilation of some statistics regarding literacy rates in the United States. It also defines some aspects of what literacy is and its importance in US society. I think the lead section is a good introduction. The content of the article is well organized and includes important sections and topics I enjoyed reading. The content looks to be up to date and correct from my knowledge. The section regarding the history of inequality in adolescent literacy has some great points of history and I appreciated this section, but this is a section I could probably add even more to because it is a topic I am very familiar with from my Needs Talk assignment. The tone of the article is neutral and I do not see any issues with it. There are many sources cited in the article, some of which I am familiar with from my research. There are a few sources I am aware of that are not included as citations or references in this article that I think would add to the article as a whole. The article is well organized into sections, however I think the sections could be rearranged to flow better. The article flows from adult literacy to adolescent literacy, but I think after reading these sections it would make more sense to have the adolescent literacy sections first because the inequalities seen in adolescent literacy practices are what lead to the repercussions we see in adults. There is only one image in this article which shows first Lady Barbara Bush in 1989 with students, which I believe is a good image, but some newer up to date graphics or images could be added, as well as keeping this one. This page is related to some WikiProjects and has a more extensive talk page as compared to the other article I am reviewing. Some of the comments on the talk page are regarding editing the introduction section as well as overall editing of the page. I think this article is well kept and a good source when looking into literacy in the United States.
 * 2) The lead section is very concise and to the point. It is quite short, but it allows someone who wants a quick overview of the topic to get that information quickly. The introduction sentence defines what adolescent literacy is and does not go too far deep. The content in the whole article is relevant; I don't think anything needs to be take out of the article but there is a lot that could be added to this article. Many different sections could be added to this article to make it more well-rounded and a better source for individuals such as the history of adolescent literacy, success stories or failures within trying to improve adolescent literacy, or a comparison between countries. The article tone is neutral and I do not think anything needs to be revised regarding the tone. The author(s) present the information and facts without a bias or trying to persuade the reader in any way. There are few citations and sources referenced only because there is such little information presented. There are definitely more sources that could be referenced and more information that could augment this article. The article is organized for it only has the introduction section and one other section. There are no images; it is a very bare article that needs some work. The talk page only has one comment regarding adding an external link to the article. It does not seem to be a very active talk page. Overall, I think this article will be a good page for me to edit or add to because it is quite bare and I have a lot of sources that can help this page become a better source.