| Lesson Title: | A Tour of Europe - Resource Evaluation | ||
| Curriculum Area: | English Language Arts | ||
| Technology Strand: | Telecommunications | ||
| Grade Level: | 6 | ||
| Essential Question: | What are the characteristics of a high quality webpage? |
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Activity Summary | Utilizing four different webpages, students will evaluate information on a single topic. They will then compare the quality of the webpages based upon four categories: Presentation, Appropriateness, Content and Validity, and Usefulness and Organization. |
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Curriculum |
English Language Arts 2.01 Explore informational materials that are read, heard, and/or viewed by reviewing the characteristics of informational works. 4.02 Develop and apply appropriate criteria to evaluate the quality of the communication by drawing conclusions based on evidence, reasons, or relevant information. |
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Technology |
Telecommunications 3.13 Use evaluation tools to select Internet resources and information for content and usefulness in content area assignments. |
| Activating Strategies |
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Prior to evaluating webpages, students should review the definition and characteristics of a webpage: 1. Open the attached file, webpage_wordsort.doc, for reviewing the concept of a webpage. 2. Using transparency copies of both the Wordsort Chart and Word List, guide students into sorting webpage-related words into four categories: Important Characteristics, Uses, Examples, Non-Examples. Detailed instructions appear on the attached document. |
| Technology Vocabulary: Telecommunications Vocabulary |
| Detailed Technology Instructions: |
| Cognitive Teaching Strategies |
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After activating students' prior knowledge using the Wordsort Activity, engage the students in evaluating the overall quality of four webpages related to their topic. 1. Assign students a topic for research related to 6th grade social studies. If you plan on teaching all of the lessons in the "A Tour of Europe" lesson series, you will need to assign each student or small group a European country as their topic. 2. Pass out the attached document, webpage_evaluation.doc. 3. Review the directions with students. 4. Model how to open the web browser and locate the first website. 5. For a more structured lesson, evaluate the first webpage together as a whole class. 6. Allow students time to evaluate the quality of the remaining three webpages. 7. Monitor student progress during this independent practice portion of the lesson. |
| Summary Strategies |
| In order to assess student learning related to this lesson's essential question, use the second page of the of the webpage_evaluation.doc document, IN YOUR OWN WORDS. In this activity, students will draw upon what they have just learned about webpages to describe the characteristics of a good webpage. For a more creative approach, have students pretend that they are designing the "ideal" webpage as they are writing. |
| Resources Click for directions on how to download files on a Windows computer. |
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Web Browser- Netscape Communicator or Internet Explorer Websites http://www.lonelyplanet.com http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook http://www.atlapedia.com http://www.state.gov/r/pa/bgn Microsoft Word Files webpage_wordsort.doc webpage_evaluation.doc |
| Re-teaching and Enrichment Activities |
| To enrich student learning, follow up with Lesson 2 in the A Tour of Europe lesson series: A Tour of Europe - Data Collection. |
| Amy Holcombe |
| Prescott Technology Center, Data last modified: 1/14/2002 |