Internet Projects are a great way for teachers to start the process of teaching students how to use the Internet. An individual or group creates a project on a website for anyone around the world to cooperate in. One example that Donald L Leu Jr stated in his article was the "Flat Stanley" project which incorporated sending letter to different school all over the world and writing about what was happening in each classroom.(Donald L.Leu Jr.,2001) Internet Projects is a great way to bring not only collaboration within the classroom but in the case of the Flat Stanley project it creates lesson in literacy, letter writing and a way for students to feel proud of all they have accomplished in school.
Internet Workshop is different in that it is a way for students to show teachers that they know how to use search engines and decipher articles on the Internet. Teachers give the students a list of websites and they are asked to perform a task. Important advice on creating a task was "to provide open-ended activity for students," so not everyone comes back with the same results.(Donald L.Leu Jr.,2002) This gives students a chance to explore the resources and really think critically about the questions.
Internet Inquiry gives students a chance to research a specific question that is important to them. It helps students build reading, critical literacy skills, navigational and collaborative skills which are all a part of internet workshop and internet projects but most importantly it develops problem identification skills. They must use Dr Leu's phases of "search, analyze, compose and share," to really understand how to get the information and how to appropriately achieve the answer to their question.(Donald L.Leu.,2002)
Webquests are like Internet Workshops in that teachers gives students resources to find out information on a certain topic but one must be careful in making sure that it is appropriate for students and that it will get them to think analytically.
All of these instructional models are similar in that they are giving teachers a new way to convey information to students and students are learning how to navigate the Internet more effectively. These models all require research and it is important especially with younger children to monitor the websites that they are entering. Many models such as Internet Project and Internet Workshop use collaborative work as a way to educate academically and socially. They are all a great way for students to think critically, analytically and to share their knowledge with the class or even the world.
Great definitions of the instructional models... you stated "Internet Workshop is different in that it is a way for students to show teachers that they know how to use search engines and decipher articles on the Internet" - however, with the Internet Workshop students are not supposed to be using a search engine (typically). Instead, the teacher selects one web site or a few web sites that students visit and then respond to questions. So rather than give students a search engine and have them search for information (which is more like the Internet Inquiry), the teacher gives them the site - no searching required.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the question for this week asks you to identify similarities and differences... rather than describe each model, you need to highlight specific differences among the models...
Finally - nice attempt at APA citations... for the first citation when you stated "One example that Donald L Leu Jr stated in his article was..." instead you should write "One example that Leu (2001) stated in his article was..." if you bring up the author's name in your post, you can include the date of pub right after the name, and then you don't need to include the citation at the end of the sentence. Also, just use the last name of the author. If you don't mention the author's name in the sentence, at the very end when you paraphrase you just use the author's last name.. for example (Leu, 2002).
You also need to have a list of references at the end of the post - where you include all information about that reference (title, URL, etc. ) - make sure you use APA standards.