Week Three Reflection

WebQuests were just coming into fashion when I left teaching—well, they were probably in fashion before then, but I had just become aware of how fashionable they were. I didn’t explore them much—they were always on my “To Do” list of things to check out, but I never quite got around to it. So I’m excited to be exploring them now, as it because the great potential they have in educating students and helping them develop critical thinking skills became immediately obvious.

My initial conception of a WebQuest was that it was, essentially, an online treasure hunt—go here, find this answer, then go to the next place to find the next answer—an idea which, frankly, did not much interest me. But in reading more about WebQuests this week I see that my initial ideas were not at all accurate. I know one of the reasons I did not explore WebQuests much when I was teaching was because it seemed just like a doing the same old thing, just with a different format. Now that I’ve explored them a bit more, however, I see their great potential for doing all those things that I struggled to integrate into my teaching—critical thinking, independent learning, higher-order thinking skills. One thing that appeals to me in particular, and that I had been completely unaware of, was that WebQuests are usually performed collaboratively, not individually. My notion of a WebQuest was that students worked on their own computers discovering information—I love, however, that they are collaborative. The collaborative aspect of WebQuests only adds to their appeal for me.

I think WebQuests, when created and used thoughtfully and reflectively, have amazing potential in education. As with incorporating anything new, however, I think the biggest stumbling block will be helping teachers see that this is not an additional burden, but something that can really help them teach. As a Library Media Specialist I hope to be able to work with other teachers to find and implement WebQuests into their teaching.