Webquests

Today, students have wide access to the internet, and it is important for teachers to encourage them to use it as a meaningful learning tool in the classroom. When used effectively, the internet can become a powerful resource to support study and exploration. Internet-based projects and webquests, for example, are excellent ways to integrate online resources into our lessons. 

Let's see how! ↓ 

There are many good reasons to bring Internet-based projects into the classroom. Let's revise some of them which are proposed in Hockly & Dudeney (2007) “Internet based project work”.

First, they give teachers a clear way to start including the Internet in lessons, both for short activities and for longer-term work. You don’t need to be a tech expert to use them, but planning and design take some time.

• Most Internet projects are group activities. This means students work together, share ideas, and communicate with each other—two of the main goals of language learning. 

• Projects can also go beyond just language practice. They can connect with other subjects and make learning more “real” for students, which helps increase their motivation.

• Internet-based projects build critical thinking skills. Instead of just copying information they find, students need to analyze it, understand it, and use it in order to complete the task.

When preparing for a project, it helps to:

• Choose the topic: Think about whether students will research a person, an event, or an issue.

• Clarify the task: Make it clear what type of information they need.

• Select resources: Decide which websites they should use and check that they are appropriate and understandable for their level.

• Define the outcome: Be clear on what students will produce in the end, for example, a poster, a presentation, or maybe a debate.

There may be find many definitions of what a webquest is: Bernie Dodge defines a webquest as “an inquiry-oriented activity in which some or all of the information that learners interact with comes from resources on the Internet” (as cited in British Council, n.d). Similarly, Philip Benz explains that a WebQuest is “a Constructivist approach to learning. Students not only collate and organize information they’ve found on the web, they orient their activities towards a specific goal they’ve been given, often associated with one or more roles modeled on adult professions” (as cited in British Council n.d).

According to Hockly and Dudeney (2007), webquests can be understood as “mini-projects in which a big quantity of input and material from the internet is given to students.” 

What differentiates webquests from other internet-based projects is their rigid structure, which typically includes the following steps:

• Introduction: presents the overall theme and background information on the topic.

• Task: explains clearly what students will have to do. It should be motivating, interesting, and anchored in a real-life situation.

• Process: guides learners through activities and research tasks using predefined resources, usually presented in clickable form.

• Evaluation: may involve self-evaluation, comparing and contrasting with peers, and teacher feedback on what students have achieved.

• Conclusion: summarizes what was learned and may invite reflection.
  
  

There are two types of webquests:

Short-term webquests: that help students deal with and make sense of new information, typically over one or two classes. 

Long-term webquests: they require deeper analysis of knowledge and end in the creation of a product either online or offline, that others can respond to. 

In both cases, students transform the information they acquire into something new.

References

British Council. (n.d.-a). Webquests. TeachingEnglish. https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/professional-development/teachers/using-digital-technologies/articles/webquests

Hockly, N., & Dudeney, G. (2007). Internet-based project work. In How to teach English with technology (Chapter 4). Pearson Education Limited.