quest

toc =Preparing for the Quest=

Introduction
View quotes on the wall

Process of Developing an Inquiry Unit
Determine Objectives Create Assessment Set instructional strategies and select resources Determine Product: authentic, meaningful... "Ban Those Bird Units!"
 * //this inquiry unit is developed based on the following assumptions...//
 * summative
 * formative
 * rubrics
 * written
 * multimedia
 * social action

Determine Essential Question - [|criteria] Determine and Refine Guiding Questions

Find information to answer the Question(s) Create - Product

What makes a good question?

 * [|Developing Different Types of Questions]
 * [|Brainstorming Research Questions]
 * [|Categorizing Research Questions]
 * [|Not all questions are created equal]
 * [|Questions: The Most Powerful Technology]
 * Handout package


 * Mini-lessons:** look at resources and strategies - what needs to be highlighted - as see kids working - what is required by deficiencies and questions -- mini lessons come from objectives or from text - not from scope and sequence.
 * teach it explicitly out of context
 * teach it in context
 * expect that it be used in all contexts

//Examples//
 * Grammar
 * Spelling
 * Technology
 * Thinking strategies
 * Online reading strategies

Finding and Using Resources

 * Teacher directs choice of all resources or provides choices
 * Scaffolding discussion/explanation - transfer of skills and techniques to all types of text

**Understanding the Architecture of the Internet**
//But while teaching has not changed, learning has. Students are learning to read, navigate, and create within a digital information environment that we scarcely address in the classroom. The great myth is that these “digital natives” know more about this new information environment than we do. **But here’s the reality: they may be experts in entertaining themselves online, but they know almost nothing about educating themselves online.** They may be learning about this digital information environment despite us, but they are not reaching the levels of understanding that are necessary as this digital information environment becomes increasingly pervasive in all of our lives. All of the classic skills we learned in relation to a print-based information universe are important, and must now be augmented by a critical understanding of the workings of digital information.// [| Michael Wesch]


 * Mini-lessons**
 * 1) organizing information using Social Bookmarking
 * 2) locating information
 * 3) reading information
 * 4) evaluating information

Organizing Information
As you embarked on a search, you most likely visited sites that you would like to access again. Social bookmarking allows multiple users to save favourite sites on the Web, instead of inside your browser, making them accessible from home, school, the library, or anywhere with Internet access.
 * Collecting and Organizing Sources Using Social Bookmarking**

This short, descriptive and informative video from [|CommonCraft], outlines three important points about social bookmarking - how to start, tagging, and the social aspect of social bookmarking:
 * Social Bookmarking in Plain English**

media type="youtube" key="x66lV7GOcNU&rel=1" height="355" width="425"

rss url="http://del.icio.us/rss/ddesroches/informationliteracy" link="true" number="10"
 * The 'cool tool**': [|del.icio.us]
 * Donna's Bookmarks
 * Donna's Inquiry Learning Bookmarks
 * [|tagging]
 * using rss - how to add to a wiki page


 * Tasks:**
 * 1) Create a delicious account
 * 2) Add the buttons to your browser toolbar
 * 3) decide on a common tag that your group will use for your bookmarks

**Searching**

 * Can you...**
 * 1) //Explain why might you use quotation marks when conducting a search? [|Answer]//
 * 2) //Identify three Boolean search terms? [|Answer]//
 * 3) //Refine a search? [|Answer]//
 * 4) //Explain how sites get to the top of a results list in Google? [|Answer]//

[|Google] and [|Google Librarian Central] offers great resources (posters, bookmarks, etc) that can be used with both staff and students. [|Ask], is a search engine arising from the previous, //Ask Jeeves//, is challenging Google. Give it a good look and see how it compares to Google.[| Google and Ask.com - a happenstance comparison] is a useful comparison.


 * Visual Search Engines** How useful are they? How can they be used to narrow and focus student searches? What role can they play in developing good search strategies and techniques?
 * [|VisuWords],
 * [|Quintura for Kids]
 * [|KartOO]
 * [|Search Crystal]


 * Search the [|Invisible Web]**
 * Saskatchewan Learning Resources on your school library page - example from Macklin School Library
 * Using //infomark// - [|Mythical Creatures Revealed] [link only works in school]


 * Create Your Own Search Engine** at http://www.google.com/coop/
 * Mysteries of the World


 * Tasks**
 * 1) Locate information on your topic using a search engine other than Google
 * 2) Use delicious to save your bookmarks tagging them with the keyword decided upon by your group
 * 3) Find at least one magazine or newspaper article using the Saskatchewan Learning Resources
 * 4) Create a search engine for your group - use the //collaboration// feature [NOTE: you will need a google account - you can use your own email]

Evaluating Information
//It remains important to be able to justify what we write, say, and do — to be able to provide evidence of its accuracy, reliability, validity, and its appropriateness in terms of the goals we’re trying to achieve.//

//What’s changed is that the responsibility for authority has shifted. The responsibility rests less with the teacher and more with the learner.// For example: //“In your chapter about quantum computing, it is critical that you site the sources, include a bibliography, and also include information about why this scientist’s perspective on subatomic processors is important to know.”//

//The skills involved in being an information gatekeeper are no longer exclusively those of the librarian or the teacher. They are now personal skills — and they are basic literacy skills. [|David Warlick]//


 * Can you....**
 * 1) //Find out who is linked to a web site? Why is this useful?// //[|Answer]//
 * 2) //Find the publisher of a web site? [|Answer]//
 * 3) //Find the history of any given Web site? [|Answer]//
 * 4) //Identify the following extensions and what they represent. [|Answer]//
 * .co || .com ||
 * .org || .net ||
 * .gov || .gov.ca ||
 * .ca || .uk ||
 * .gc || .k12 ||
 * .mil ||  ||


 * Sources for Evaluating Online Information**
 * **[|Sample Checklist for Evaluating Health-related Information (Grade 6) -pdf]**
 * [|Kathy Schrock's Critical Evaluation Surveys]
 * [|Quick Quiz]


 * Creating evaluation annotations using delicious.

Tasks:**
 * Select 2 of the sources you located during your search
 * Evaluate them using the criteria from one of the tools above
 * note your evaluation in the 'notes' field of the delicious bookmark

Reading a web site:
A [|think-aloud] example of using reading strategies to //unlock// a website to increase further understanding and knowledge. Slides proceed as you follow this think aloud. [|Online Reading Strategies]: PowerPoint

Documenting Evidence from the Experts:

 * Donna's rant
 * [|BibMe]

Task:
 * create a reference page of at least two of the resources you found - one should be a magazine or encyclopedia article from the Saskatchewan Learning Resources.

rss url="http://del.icio.us/rss/ddesroches/inquiry_learning" link="true" number="10"**
 * Resources