Integrating Internet
Content
|
As a college student, you are very familiar with the Internet and how to navigate its vast collection of resources. But what do you really use it for? Sure thing, Email and Research Email is a wonderful tool for seeking information, asking questions, and just socializing with family and friends, but most schools block access to email fro students because of child safety issues. Research is also a wonderful task to use with internet resources, but how to you ask a 5 year old who can't yet read, to conduct research? |
Hmmm.. there must be other ways to use the Internet in the classroom! |
Why Would You Use the Internet?
Although the Internet does hold a vast amount of information, it is NOT the answer for everything. If you need specific information, want to involve your students in collaborative, real-world problem-solving, would like to publish some writing or art work, then use the Internet! But reading a novel is best left to hand-held books, and learning how to write requires using a pencil and paper or a word processor. Realize, too, that limited access can dictate if it's a feasible consideration for instruction at a specific time.
|
Be Prepared All effective teachers plan and plan well, creating different scenarios to cover the ways that lessons might go. Utilizing the internet and its resources means planning and being prepared in the same way that you would plan for using a new text or video or science experiment. This type of planning is nothing new for a good teacher. Know what your objectives are for your lessons and seek out the resources to help you meet them. Make sure the students also know their objectives for using the internet. That is the best way to keep everyone on task and ensure effective use of online time. The use of any new strategy takes time to perfect. Realize there are management skills, scheduling, and new ways of approaching curriculum which will be more consistently effective with the use of all technology, including the internet. Consider these concepts for integrating the internet into your teaching. Following each topic are a few samples you might enjoy visiting.
|
Enrich Your Curriculum Integrate internet materials into your teaching. Revise a lesson plan with an interactive presentation or create a new lesson using online resources. Access an interactive map, an animation of molecular structure, an audioclip of a historic speech, complete a coloring page. Have on "online book" read to your students. Search for interactive and engaging materials. Enhance a Lesson Takes students on an online an archeological dig, run experiments at a science museum, tour a Gothic cathedral or launch your students online to renegotiate the Constitution or reorchestrate tunes for Ellington's band. Instead of showing a video or passing out worksheets, use the Internet to set up a learning center where students take a guided tour, experiment with an interactive simulation or work through a problem-solving scenario.  Scrapbook Projects - Provide links to carefully selected Web sites where students can gather images, sounds, quotations, facts and figures and use them in the development of a project. Reading for Meaning - Prepare a list of questions and Web sites where students can find the answers. Alter the level of difficulty in the types of questions you write. WebQuests - Engage students in higher-order thinking skills by selecting an appropriate WebQuest in which they participate as a member of a team. |
||||||||||||||||||||||