This week I am supposed to determine what subect I want use for the WebQuest I'll be designing. It's been an interesting decision. Because I'm not teaching this year, I'm not tied to any particular grade level or topic, so I've been all over the board trying to make a choice. I thought seriously about using 4th grade life science, because it's the topic of my thesis project, which is also technology based. I thought the WebQuest would be a nice companion piece, but after reading Jennifer Diaz's blog, I decided that she made a good point. Even though a WebQuest would be interesting and informative for the students, I would rather use my time in science with hands on inquiry. I also gave it some thought and I don't think many of my teacher friends would have time to add a WebQuest to their science unit, considering how limited they are on time and the limited access to computers, so while I haven't given up on the idea entirely, I started looking at other possibilities for this assignment.
Something that's important to me is that the WebQuest I construct is put into use. With that in mind I went to ask the fifth grade teachers at my school if there was a WebQuest they would want to use in their classrooms and there was a strong agreement that they would like to have a WebQuest for social studies. I haven't spent a lot of time with social studies and I'm kind of excited to create a project in an academic area that will let me learn new information as I go. I read through the content standards this morning and I think I'll focus on the causes, course and consequences of the American Revolution. It should be interesting! I'll let you know how it's going as I get things started. ~Sheri
I like your train of thought Sheri - but - here's some things to get you thinking ;-)
ReplyDelete~ WQs are best suited to cross curricular student work
~ What content area/standards are ones that are always left to last and barely addressed?
~ Can they be combined with other standards in other content areas?
Well, your post certainly got the wheels turning. I often try to integrate writing into just about anything I can, and I was thinking about finding ways to do the same with this activity, though based on that description, I can hardly say that it is "always left to last and barely addressed". Art also comes to mind as an area where, especially in the upper grades, there seems to be less focus.
ReplyDeleteI'm assuming that you aren't suggesting changing the Social Studies focus, but instead adding the cross curricular component. My initial thought was to create a period newspaper complete with written columns and artwork, but in looking through some of the WQs out there, it looks like it's been done. I don't know if that particular WQ is fully operational, but it did have the newspaper component. I'll see if I can find some more creative possibilities for integration across the curriculum.