Project-based learning & WebQuests

Something that I learnt this week is that despite the fact that a great percentage of the population in the world, especially teenagers and young-adults are now connected to the digital life (e-Mail, chat-rooms, mobile communications and social networks among others) some teachers are still reluctant to get into the pace of technology.

Technology has given students a high degree of independency in the process of learning; the only one thing we should to do is inspire our students to asume this new challenge as theirs in perspective of Learner-Centered Education.

Project-base Learning (PBL) is defined as collaborative learning and gives a high-degree of independency to our students and is expressed in rates as Pew Internet Website shows in its research about Social Media and Young Adults.

Some requirements to be followed are necessary, and criteria to design Project-Base Learning activities should consider centrality, driving question, constructive investigations, autonomy, and realism.

However, a big question comes to my mind: How are We -The Teachers- going to integrate this new tendency to teaching procedures? and even harder to think, what kind of tool do we have available?.

WebQuest is a good way to go through. Guiding our Digitalized Students to make some research on the web, designing inquiry-oriented lesson formats in which most or all the information that learners work will come from the web.

Wow, this is great!

Well, not at all. If content is not well designed, it might become totally meaninless to our students, and it won't have any expected result.

Jeremy Harmer has a very interesting point of view on the matter that all of this content must be meaninful to students. Here we can listen to what he said to BBC Learning English a time ago.

Another tool we can is Rubircs. Rubrics can help measure student performances beyond the data that can be collected by standardized, high-stakes tests and, even better, it can help students self-evaluate their job to success. Thus, communicating the evaluation criteria is highly important.

ESL classes are rich of material to explore in making Language-Learning Process meaninful by using authentic and atractive e-content.

Some examples and guidance on creating Rubrics for Projec-Based Learning Activites can be found in Rubistar, and WebQuest.org is also a well rated site for teachers support in this matter.