Dear stakeholder:
This week, I learned about two new methods of teaching language in the classroom: the Problem-Based Learning and WebQuests. What I retain from the two methods is they use a different new methodology for teaching in the classroom. They advocate the involvement of students in meaningful and interesting activities in which they will have to work as a community to perform a common task.
In her article “Less Teaching and More Learning” Susan Gaer at http://www.ncsall.net/?id=385 shows how efficient PBL is because she successfully reached her goals using PBL.
Bernie Dogde in "Some Thoughts About WebQuests" at http://webquest.sdsu.edu/about_webquests.html defines WebWuest as “an inquiry-oriented activity in which some or all of the information that learners interact with comes from resources on the internet, optionally supplemented with videoconferencing”.
WebQuests seem to be an alternative to teaching language in the classroom. Yet, in some educational environment it will not be possible to take advantage of this new teaching technology because the use of computers and the Internet is still at a nascent stage. So, the option remaining for the teachers will be PBL. I do not say that PBL is better than Webquests, I simply mean that PBL is more like to have success in some countries for the reasons mentioned above.
As far as I am concerned, PBL is definitely the method I will choose between the two methods because my students and won’t need any equipment for realizing the project.
What do you think?
Wishes,
Bruno
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Bruno,
ReplyDeleteI do agree with that these two types of methods requires that students work as a team to perform a task. It is amazing the different activities we can have in our classes with PBL and WebQuests. It is also true that PBL is more convenient for classes that do not have access to computers and internet. As I said in one of my posts, we just need some creativity to present the projects to our class for the students to get involved in it.
Cristian
Hi Bruno,
ReplyDeleteyou wrote quote:"yet in some educational environment it will not be possible to take advantage of this new teaching technology because the use of computers and the internet is still at a nascent stage."
It is true that today webquest assignments are mainly given on the web itself,the home page webquest serving as the starting point of students'information inquiry.However , when there's no technology around,we can give a paper-based webquest with us teachers being the resource providers with texbooks, handouts,printer friendly versions of web materials and so on.Of course here the resources list cannot be extended endlessly, but what matters most is the task that will develop our students'thinking skills.Using the web is funnier but not indispensable.Bernie Dodge himself started with a paper-based inquiry.
Hassina