A WebQuest on WebQuests
. . . focusing on science education

This activity has been taken from Bernie Dodge's "A WebQuest about WebQuests" and slightly modified to accommodate a science education perspective. We recommend that you explore The WebQuest Page - a resource site for educators using WebQuests in the classroom.  Here you will find excellent examples and other materials to help you.

Introduction
Since early in 1995, teachers everywhere have learned how to use the web well by adopting the WebQuest format to created inquiry-oriented lessons. But what exactly is a WebQuest? What does it feel like to do one? How do you know a good one when you see it?  In the space of 30-45 minutes, you're going to grapple with these questions and more. 

The Task
To develop great WebQuests, you need to develop a thorough understanding of the different possibilities open to you as you create web-based lessons. One way for you to get there is to critically analyze a number of WebQuest examples and discuss them from multiple perspectives. That's your task in this exercise.

By the end of this lesson, you and your group will answer these questions:

1.What criteria would your expert group use to evaluate a WebQuest?
2.Which one of the example WebQuests listed below is the best? Why? 
3.Which one is the worst? Why? 

Resources
Here are the sites you'll be analyzing:

Do Your Part

http://questgarden.com/61/35/4/080228085419/process.htm

 

What is the Matter

http://questgarden.com/47/51/2/070305124023/process.htm

 

Electrical Power Production

http://www.nisd.net/clark/Techweb/Elec%20Power/Index.htm

 

Genes, the Building Blocks of  Life

http://oncampus.richmond.edu/academics/education/projects/webquests/genes/

 



The Process

1. You belong to a team of four experts. Each of you will assume one of the following roles: 

The Efficiency Expert

You value time a great deal. You believe that too much time is wasted in today's classrooms on unfocused activity and learners not knowing what they should be doing at a given moment. To you, a good WebQuest is one that delivers the most learning bang for the buck. If it's a short, unambitious activity that teaches a small thing well, then you like it. If it's a long term activity, it had better deliver a deep understanding of the topic it covers, in your view.

The Affiliator

To you, the best learning activities are those in which students learn to work together. WebQuests that force collaboration and create a need for discussion and consensus are the best in your view. If a WebQuest could be done by a student working alone, it leaves you cold.

The Altitudinist

Higher level thinking is everything to you. There's too much emphasis on factual recall in schools today. The only justification for bringing technology into schools is if it opens up the possibility that students will have to analyze information, synthesize multiple perspectives, and take a stance on the merits of something. You also value sites that allow for some creative expression on the part of the learner.

Science Education Expert 

In your opinion, controversial issues are excellent, just as long as they do not take precedence over the science curriculum. This is science class, remember?! You prefer a site that invites students to learn about curricular material in an interesting and interactive way. You are critical of sites that may be science related, but the assignments could just as easily be completed without any scientific knowledge. 

2. Individually, you'll examine each of the sites on the list of resources and write down some notes of your opinions of each from the perspective of your role. You'll need to examine each site fairly quickly. Don't spend more than 10 minutes on any one site.

3. When everyone in the group has seen all the sites, it's time to get together to answer the questions. One way to proceed would be to go around and poll each team member for the best and worst sample WebQuest, according to their decided criteria. (i.e. Ask each member their answers to the three aforementioned questions.) Pay attention to each of the other perspectives, even if at first you think you might disagree with them.

4. There will probably not be unanimous agreement, so the next step is to talk together to hammer out a compromise consensus about your team's nominations for best and worst. Pool your perspectives and see if you can agree on what's best for the learner.

5. Use Inspiration software to map your group conversation toward deciding the best and worst overall WebQuests. 

6. When debriefing time is called, use this Inspiration document to speak from as you report your results to the whole class. Do you think the other groups will agree with your conclusions? Enjoy a class discussion.

Conclusion
Ideally, this exercise will provide you with a larger pool of ideas to work with when creating your own WebQuests for your students. The best WebQuest is yet to be written. It might be yours!