Explorers A to Z ... or not?

I am preparing a unit for my 5th graders on explorers and was looking for sites to add to my livebinder for them to use to research their person. I came across Explorers A to Z and it looked like a great site! Looking a little closer, I realized it will be a great site...but not for the reason I thought. Instead of using it for our explorer unit, I will be adding it to my website evaluation unit - on my list of hoax sites. You can see more about the Explorer A to Z site here and how it is meant to be used. They have even color coded the Treasure Hunts for facts by easier with more surface level fact problems to harder, more fact specific issues so you can challenge kids at the level you want. The Treasure Hunts give a real site to visit and their own fake one so they can compare the information.

This is a perfect site to use along with sites like the Northwest Tree Octopus in helping students learn more about how to look at a site and that just because it looks legit, doesn't mean the information is correct. As I was reading about Christopher Columbus, I thought at first they made some typos, because I know he didn't sail in 1942, but of course he didn't have infomercials or a toll free phone number either. Hopefully, kids would catch these things, but then again I was surprised how many still thought the Northwest Tree Octopus was real even after really exploring the website.

What sites do you use for website evaluation and examples of hoax sites? (See a list of my main ones on my livebinder.)

What sites do you use for information about explorers?