How can we design lessons that stimulate student inquiry?
Preface
Hey team!
Looking over each group's wiki, I see there is some confusion concerning what I am looking for in the 'ERIC Abstract' section. Summaries of your ERIC articles, not your lesson plan, is what you should be pouring into that space. The purpose of writing summaries of your research articles is to help organize materials to build into the lesson, and to have a reference point, dans la futur, when new assignments occupy the field.
This second purpose of summarizing articles is something I realized the hard way, and I am offering my trials and tribulations to all of you so to save you from the errors of my own life. Many times I have been assigned a task to design a module with various specifications, and as I developed the curriculum, a flash of memory occupied my mind, recalling me to a place where, sitting a table, I read an article satisfying the specficiations of my current writing task. And then the burning question: "where did I read that ... "? I can assure you, my friends, that bumbling and stumbling through stacks of paper, seeking the answer never works. Having a conveniently located list of summaries is the best way to answer the question, and, once you develop that productive work habit, I assure you, you will never go back to dumping your research into a pile of processed dead trees, never to see the light of day again.
I put together the following summaries in hour, as an example of what to pour into that wiki space.
LoParrino, Camille A. (2005). A Transformational Process: Facilitating WebQuests (ED 490 748)
A "Day in the Life..." of a Bronx student teacher. She developed a WebQuest about Monarch Butterflies with the help of her Fordham U mentor. Elementary students from P.S. 83 in the Bronx chose one of three roles: Researchers, Scientists, and Dieticians. This paper offers a step by step process for developing a WebQuest.
Chatel, R. & Nodell, J. (2002) WebQuests: Teachers and Students as Global Literacy Explorers. ED 471 843.
These teachers have produced a gold mine of on-line tools to help teacher create WebQuests, including excellent descriptive rubrics.
Young, D. & Wilson, D. (2002). WebQuests for Reflection and Conceptual Change: Variations on a Popular Model for Guided Inquiry. ED 477 112
Describes the structure of a WebQuest. The paper links WebQuest activities to a broader, schema-based approach to learning. By linking WebQuest activities to the STAR Legacy model, the authors demonstrate how these types of research are student-centered, and enhance instructional delivery.
Schweizer, Heidi; Kossow, Ben. (2007) WebQuests: Tools for Differentiation. Gifted Child Today, v30 n1 p29-35 Win 2007 (EJ750569)
http://www.ncsu.edu/meridian/jul99/webquest/webquest2.html
http://webquest.org/search/
m-Learning
WebQuests
ubiquitous
digital divide
http://webquest.sdsu.edu/taskonomy.html
So let's take our Practicum II experiences to the next level, and integrate WebQuests into our unit plans.
WebQuests
Escaping the dusky textbook
So far, we've looked at online educational resources and the nature of "educational social software." Blogs and wikis are by far the most common ESSs used by teachers today. Another genre predates Web 2.0, the WebQuest. What is a WebQuest? Here's a definition:A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented activity, where some or all of the material a student interacts with comes from the resources on the Internet. WebQuests eliminate the need for a student to search, sometimes endlessly for information on a topic, since prescreened links are provided in the WebQuest. Another benefit to using WebQuests is that they are easily created and support any curriculum topic. They are motivating and highly interactive, allowing students to use real life resources that are up to date.WNET has an excellent online workshop about WebQuests. You might even be able to get professional credits for viewing it.
Educators need to view the WebQuest in two ways: how to design and evaluate it, the other is what each step of a WebQuest will look like to a student. Let's look at the final product first.
Instead of writing traditional, linear text with links to click on, WebQuests take a constructivist approach to learning. A WebQuest is, "an inquiry-oriented activity in which some or all of the information that learners interact with comes from resources on the Internet." Usually, the quest is divided in the following sections:
Students typically complete WebQuests in cooperative groups. Each student in each group has a specific research role. Let's jump back into one, and see how they work.
Each of you will take on a role, and evaluate a handful of WebQuests. Once everyone on the group has evaluated each WebQuest, based upon their persona, your group will collectively evaluate each WebQuest.
Creating online inquiry
Framing student exploration
So we're back at one of the main issues of this colloquium: how to create educational writings that aren't like dusty books, that are more than static lists of information. Creating a storyline line for students to move back and forth through, allows students to move along at their own pace, searching out what they are specifically interested in, while keeping the focus and objectives of the online research intact.
Of course, if you're creating a WebQuest (hint, hint) you're more likely to gather all the materials you want to include in the online lesson before you organize it into the above steps. Here are some additional resources to help you craft your WebQuest:
- Bernie Dodge's WebQuest Resources
- A Road Map for Designing WebQuests
- Writing WebQuests for the Classroom
- WebQuest Resources
Evaluation
Homework #3
Let's recap what we've done, or should have done, by now:- Each student searched for and summarized three articles about how the classroom will look different than it is today.
- Each group developed a lesson plan that includes NYS and NYC standards, an Aim, development of the lesson, and a summary.
- Each group used ERIC to find four education articles (and APA citations) that relate to their lesson plan.
- Each group uploaded their information to their wiki page.
- Each group found 3-6 Internet lesson plans similar to their own.
- Each group completed the Blog WebQuest and uploaded their answers to their wiki page.
Deliverable #1: Each group will use the materials they have gathered so far to develop a WebQuest. To do so, please follow the below steps:
- Organize the Introduction, Task, Process, Evaluation, Conclusion, and Teacher Page from your materials.
- Use an online resource to generate your WebQuest. The best one is filamentality, another one is blogs2teach . If you prefer to save your WebQuest to disk, you can use aclearn.net or seneca.
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