Dear Mrs. Bannon and Fellow Teachers,

I hope that you have enjoyed my WebQuest. I was delighted to be Brendan's learning partner in this project. Both Brendan and I were able to learn from this endeavor. As a graduate student at Columbia University Teachers College, I am in the midst of completing a class entitled "Hypermedia and Education." This WebQuest represents my final project for the semester.

Thoughout my studies at Columbia, I have examined various theories of learning. I believe that the Constructivist Teaching Approach is utilized through the use of a WebQuest. The Constructivist style of learning is described in the book Theoretical Foundations of Learning Environments (edited by David H. Jonassen and Susan M. Land) as an environment which “supports individuals or groups as they attempt to negotiate multiple rather than singular points of view, reconcile competing and conflicting perspectives and beliefs, and construct personally relevant meaning accordingly. (Jonassen 2000) Instead of the teacher lecturing and the student receiving information, the constructivist approach places the class in a knowledge gathering role. According to this theory, students will retain far more by building their knowledge. Every individual has a different point of view and a different knowledge base. By sharing their point of view and utilizing their knowledge base, the student can construct and retain new knowledge.

Another concept enhanced by a WebQuest is "Communities of Practice." The formal definition of a Community of Practice is "a group of people who share a common interest in a topic or area...for building their collaborative knowledge with a sense of common collective tasks." Jonassen in Learning to Solve Problems with Technology, makes a good point when he says that “If working and learning together in communities is so natural, why do schools individualize learning and make its outcomes competitive among students?”  (David H. Jonassen 2003)

Most schools in today’s society foster the individual’s knowledge and deliberately disconnect the bridges between students.  By doing so, they have eliminated the opportunity to build knowledge together.  Competition is fostered rather than ownership of knowledge built as a team.

Placed in practical terminology, the teacher in a constructivist environment must:

1. constantly observe student activities
2. keep an eye out for the individual student who is struggling
3. keep an eye out for the group that is stuck
4. keep an eye out for the group engaged in a dysfunctional process
5. pay attention to content, reasoning and outcomes
6. pay attention to group attitudes and chemistry
7. monitor discussions, ensuring that discussions remain focused
8. guard against flaming, where students ridicule each other’s comments
9. collect data for assessing the quality of discussion
10. most importantly, a good teacher knows how to get out of the way when students are working well together.

I fully realize, however, that in a work environment of high stakes testing and a tight curriculum to accomplish, we do not always have the luxury of the time needed to apply these approaches.

If you have a moment, I would love to receive feedback from you about this WebQuest.

Educationally Yours,

Sharon Mistretta

Works Quoted (Titles are Links to Barnes and Noble):

David H. Jonassen, J. H., Joi Moore, Rose M. Marra (2003). Learning to Solve Problems with Technology. Upper Saddle River, N.J.
         
Jonassen, D. H. a. L., Susan M. (2000). Theoretical Foundations of Learning Environments. Mahwah, N.J., Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Mrs. Bannon! Here are some web sites that I love!

This site promotes open-ended exploration of math concepts. It is written by an elementary school teacher, Wendy Patty, to supplement math activities in the classroom. Click here for Math Cats Web Site!

This site is the best search engine. It combines the Google, Yahoo, MSN Search and Ask Jeeves engines. Click here for Metacrawler Web Site!