Teaching with the Web
In teacher speak, lesson chapters covering periods (history), genres/style (English), concepts (Math) among others are called “units”. They separate levels of knowledge in the students’ classroom lives, as they move on towards the culmination of the school year.
With the onset of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), these units must not be discussed using only books, film strips, black boards or a lesson book. These days, the Internet should be used as a tool for learning, as it slowly gets incorporated into the curricula.
Instead of units, here are some ways to establish “Web units” in the classroom:
Stage 1. Add to an existing unit
For example, if your lesson on meteorology used to require students in teams of two to become weather reporters using cutouts from newspapers, why not add an Internet component to it? Bookmark reliable weather forecast websites on your Web browser (Mozilla Firefox or Microsoft Explorer), and allow the weather reporters to research the day’s forecast. Whatever daily weather report they can gather, they share to the class.
Stage 2. Add some Internet-based activities
In science class, when discussing the human body, you can create an activity for your students using the Internet. Try to find 5-10 quality websites that contain the unit’s lessons, and develop two or three activities from each website.
Organize the activities into a Web-based human body activity guide which the students can work in teams in. This online learning gives them a taste of two-way information sharing that is in support of your regular lectures and discussions.
Stage 3. Add other media
Introduce a major web-based activity to discuss a major lesson, with support from other media. When discussing the Spanish conquest of the Philippines, develop an activity using only the Internet for the most part. Come up with 20-25 websites appropriate for your curriculum and students, and find an online expert that can participate.
On the first day of the Web unit, ask the students to put their history books away. Give an overview about the Spanish’s 300 years of colonization, inviting the students to add the information they already know.
Then, get them to formulate their own questions about the wars and battles then, the people’s lifestyles, the politics or anything that might pique their interest. You, as the facilitator, can take this list of questions and use it to drive the students into research.
Prepare them with the research skills they need, helping them prepare a thorough questioning plan to guide their research. Oversee the entire research process using the Internet resources you have prepared. In the end, the students learn based on their inquiries, and on course with the curriculum in an entirely Web-based manner.
Steps in creating quality Web-based units
- Start with your curriculum. Focus on what the topic is and what the objectives are. Determine the time frame and the possible activities for the topic at hand.
- Search for websites. Classroom.com has back issues with helpful site reviews; and Instructor has online experts and videoconference opportunities. Don’t simply collect websites. Also look for email addresses and names, anything that can help improve the curriculum.
- Create the activities using the websites you have found. They can either be information activities, reaction activities or processing activities. If one has a good map of the human body or interactive math problems or virtual tours of a historical landmark, then that’s a good start.
- Check if the activities are in line with the objectives.
- Implement the Web unit.
- Evaluate the success of the process, and the students’ reactions to it.
All these could be a good way for you and your students to become more and more competent in ICT. Even President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo noted of this in a speech in Cebu City in 2008. She said that ICT could provide jobs to millions of Filipinos being the wave of the future.
Her call for a better ICT integration in the country’s educational system could very well be heeded in your small steps toward combining Web units with traditional ones.
Sources:
Deirdre, Kelly. “Creating Web Units.” Retrieved January 25, 2009 from
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=4122
Laparan, Leo Ortega and Mosqueda, Mars. “ICT educators needed by RP, President says.” Retrieved January 26, 2009 fromhttp://www.mb.com.ph/issues/2006/09/07/MAIN2006090773720.html
(Published 02 February 2009, Smart Communications, Inc.)
