SIFT Method Worksheet
A guided worksheet for Mike Caulfield's SIFT method: Stop, Investigate the source, Find better coverage, and Trace claims, quotes and media to the original context. Note what you are checking, answer a few prompts for each move, reach a conclusion, and print the worksheet or copy a summary for your notes. Runs in your browser. Free, no sign-up.
SIFT Method Worksheet
SIFT is Mike Caulfield's four-move habit for checking information online: Stop, Investigate the source, Find better coverage, and Trace claims, quotes and media to the original context. The questions below are this worksheet's prompts for each move.
S — Stop
Before you read or share, ask whether you know the source and its reputation. And if fact-checking pulls you off track, stop and recall your purpose.
0 of 3 answered
Reading for fun needs a lighter check than citing it in an essay or sharing it with others.
I — Investigate the source
Know what you are reading before you read it. A minute on who is behind it and what they know is usually enough.
0 of 5 answered
Open new tabs and see what others say about the source — a Wikipedia article, a news search, a fact-checker — instead of reading its own “About” page alone.
F — Find better coverage
Set the article aside and look for trusted coverage of the claim itself, and for whether experts agree.
0 of 3 answered
Title, publisher and link — a reference work, a fact-check, trusted reporting, or the research itself.
T — Trace claims, quotes and media to the original context
Find where the quote, image, video or study came from, and check that what you saw is what the original said.
0 of 4 answered
Cropped, clipped, out of date, quoted without its next sentence, a study that does not support the claim.
Conclusion
SIFT is by Mike Caulfield: “SIFT (The Four Moves)”, hapgood.us, 19 June 2019, licensed CC BY 4.0. His related course material is “Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers”. The worksheet questions are CitationEasy's own.
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Questions on the worksheet
Start with the first move: Stop, and note what you are checking.
How to Use the SIFT Method Worksheet
- 1. Say what you are checking. Paste or describe the claim, post or page, and where you found it. Keep it specific: one claim at a time.
- 2. Work through the four moves in order. Answer the prompts under Stop, Investigate, Find and Trace. Skip any that do not apply; you do not need to fill every box.
- 3. Reach a conclusion. Choose whether the claim is supported, partly supported, not supported or unverified, and what you will do next.
- 4. Print or copy. Print gives a clean worksheet to hand in or file; Copy summary gives your answers as text for a notes app or a lab book.
The Four Moves of SIFT
SIFT was devised by Mike Caulfield, who describes it in “SIFT (The Four Moves)” (hapgood.us, 2019, CC BY 4.0). It is built for the way people actually meet information online: quickly, in the middle of something else. The point is to make a short, useful check before you invest in reading, sharing or citing.
| Move | The idea | A few minutes of work |
|---|---|---|
| Stop | Before you read or share, ask whether you know the source and its reputation. If checking pulls you off course, stop again and remember what you set out to do. | Name your purpose. Notice whether the claim has made you feel strongly. |
| Investigate the source | Know what you are reading before you read it: who is behind it, what they know about the topic, and what they might want. | Open a new tab and look the source up elsewhere. About a minute is usually enough. |
| Find better coverage | Set the article aside and look for trusted reporting or analysis of the claim itself, and for whether experts agree. | Search for the claim, not the page. Look for a reference work, a fact-check or the research. |
| Trace claims, quotes and media to the original context | Find where a quote, image, video or study came from, and check that what you saw is what the original said. | Follow the link or search for the original. Compare it with the version you saw. |
Lateral Reading
The moves put into practice what researchers call lateral reading: leaving a page to find out what others say about it, rather than studying the page itself. A study by the Stanford History Education Group, reported by Wineburg and McGrew in Teachers College Record (2019), found that professional fact-checkers did this quickly and reliably, while historians and university students who read the page closely were more often misled by a polished site. The Investigate step is where lateral reading starts; the worksheet asks which independent pages you consulted.
SIFT and the CRAAP Test
The CRAAP Test Evaluator asks you to judge a source by its own features: currency, relevance, authority, accuracy and purpose. SIFT adds what a checklist on the page cannot: what the rest of the web says about the source and the claim. For an assignment source, use CRAAP to decide whether it earns a place in your paper, and SIFT when a claim, quote or image needs checking first.
An Illustration
Suppose a social-media post says a vitamin supplement cures colds, and links a news-style page. Stop: you do not recognise the site, and the post makes you want to share it, so you pause. Investigate: a quick search shows the site is run by a company that sells the supplement. Find better coverage: a search for the claim turns up a reference work and a review of clinical trials, which describe weak evidence for shortening colds. Trace: the page cites “a study”; following the link, you find a small trial whose authors did not make the claim the page attributes to them. The conclusion is “not supported”, and the next step is to look for a better source. The example is invented to show the sequence, not drawn from a real page.
Limits of the Method
- It is a quick check, not a verdict. A few minutes will not settle a contested scientific question; it will tell you whether a source or claim deserves more of your time.
- Better coverage still needs judging. Run the same moves on the sources you find.
- Scholarly sources need their own checks. For journal articles, look at the journal, peer review and retractions. See How to Tell If a Source Is Credible.
- The worksheet does not save. Your answers stay on the page and disappear when you close it, so print or copy first.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What does SIFT stand for?
- Stop; Investigate the source; Find better coverage; Trace claims, quotes and media to the original context. They are four short moves for checking information online.
- Who created the SIFT method?
- Mike Caulfield, a digital-literacy researcher. He set out SIFT in 2019, building on the four moves in his “Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers” material, which is openly licensed.
- What is the difference between SIFT and the CRAAP test?
- CRAAP is a checklist of a source's own qualities — currency, relevance, authority, accuracy and purpose. SIFT sends you off the page to see what other sources say about it and about the claim. They work well together.
- What is lateral reading?
- Lateral reading means opening new tabs to find out who is behind a page and what others say about it before you read the page closely. It is the habit that distinguished professional fact-checkers in a Stanford study.
- How long should the SIFT moves take?
- Usually a few minutes, and sometimes seconds. The Investigate move is often described as taking about a minute. Spend longer when a claim matters, such as one you plan to cite or share.
- Can I use SIFT on images, videos and AI-generated answers?
- Yes. The fourth move is about tracing media to its origin, for example by searching for the original of a clipped video or a photo. For a chatbot's answer, trace each claim to a source you can open and read.
- Do I need to fill in every box?
- No. Use the prompts that help. Skipping a move that does not apply is better than writing something to fill the space.