Today’s educators are being asked to incorporate critical thinking, cooperative learning, authentic assessment, and technology in teaching. WebQuests were designed to bring the most effective instructional practices together in a student-led, teacher-driven activity. The WebQuest model addresses a wide range of topics, goals, environments and learners; as well as technology applications.
Thanks to a post from Cool Cat Teacher on her Westwood Wikispace, I just found an awesome website. ChicagoCrimes.org is a database that integrates the Google Earth database and the Chicago crimes. It gives a list of all the crimes committed in Chicago and also a map of the location of the crimes.
posted by Sandy Schaufelberger @ 5:01 PM
Today’s educators are being asked to incorporate critical thinking, cooperative learning, authentic assessment, and technology in teaching. WebQuests were designed to bring the most effective instructional practices together in a student-led, teacher-driven activity. The WebQuest model addresses a wide range of topics, goals, environments and learners; as well as technology applications.
4 Comments:
For my English classes, it would be cool to use Google Earth in order to cross reference it with information about authors and literary movements. For instance, you could Google Earth the homes of famous authors, or landmarks for famous literary movements. Being able to see information would make it more relevant, and better reach visual learners. It would also just be very cool.
-Michael Klein
That's a great idea! I think you've got another good use in your subject area.
Krista Koch--My 6th grade social studies class will be studying various cultures throughout the year. I am planning on assigning a project--"Where would you like to live?" towards the end of the year. This particular website would be helpful as a sub-lesson. The students could select an address and evaluate the type and amount of crime in that area. They could also select a place of employment and map out the way to travel to work that leads through the "safest" areas. I am positive that crime is not one of the areas that the students would have considered in choosing a location for residence. This could be an eye opening activity.
Fred Hicks - I agree with Maria that this could be used as a math/statistics assignment. I think it would also be a good webquest for interdisciplinary lesson. At Hamilton Community Schools, we have been trying to do more interdisciplinary lessons in the junior high and I think this has potential.
Post a Comment
<< Home