Lesson 12 Reflection

Now that you have seen the work that is being done to support online, digital resources, many of you will be thinking about your own commitment or support for this area. Again, if your time or the technology in your school is limited, you can start with some basic lessons that will indicate to the students the importance of using the better Internet sites and digital resources. It won't be a matter of convincing the students that the Internet is an important source of information. The challenge will be for you to get them to access the better sites. If you agree with the above, consider how you, in your schools, might you go about this?


I think that pre-screening websites is one way to help students access better sites on the internet. I have started doing this when a teacher comes and asks me if we have anything on "X" and I say no. Now that I've created a website, I have a section for students and for teachers, and I have some content loaded for teachers. Teachers need to further screen what I have chosen, then let the students have access. I choose according to grade level, and the appropriate reading level. I have also found youtube videos on such diverse topics as Fission and Fusion (for physics) as well as Tecumseh, a First Nations leader (social studies). The teachers were glad to have me do the initial search, and then to have these resources easily available for students to use.


Another way to start encouraging students to use better websites would be to introduce them to kids' search engines. Students could do a comparison: first do a google search (with millions of hits) and then use a couple of selected kids' search engines and see what they come up with. Since kids' search engines already have limitations, the results are much easier for students to use, and the reading level is more appropriate.


I know that I have done a lesson on encyclopedias. I had students compare World Book in hard copy and Wikipedia. In general, wikipedia had too much information and the reading level was too high. Some of the articles scrolled down for pages and pages and finding any relevant information was too difficult for middle school students. So using an appropriate online encyclopedia for kids would be much more useful, though we don't have subscriptions to any, and I have not yet taken the time to find appropriate ones available online.