Projects and WebQuests for language learning

Dear All

I read Gaer's (19998) article 'Less Teaching and More Learning' at http://www.ncsall.net/?id=385. I like the projects cookbook and folktales. In the first project, the students come to the classroom with their own food items from their own culture, prepare recipes, share it with the friends and prepare food. The recipes are published in the cookbook.

In the second project, the students tell the folktales supplemented by pictures from their own countries to the middle school students. The middle school students listen to their stories and write them. After that, the students evaluate the accuracy of language written by the middle school students. Moreover, they should also go to the library and find out appropriate pictures to go with the stories their stories.

There are many advantages of such projects. First, the students become more independent and autonomous. They also see the relevance of learning English in the classroom. For example, in the both projects mentioned above the students are not telling any foreign or unfamiliar stories rather they are sharing their own food items and stories. This gives a sort of authority to them. Importantly, this develops not only the language and literacy skills but also maintains intercultural communication among the students. At the same time, such project works develop the culture of co-operative learning among the students. I like Gaer's idea "Less teaching and more learning."

I also went through Megan Crossen's 'Propaganda' at http://questgarden.com/98/99/3/100324155339/ which is useful for my Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA). I will be taking the course Reading, Writing and Critical Thinking for BBA in one private college next month. There is one reading on propaganda technique in the course. The instruction given in each component (Introduction, task, process, evaluation, and conclusion) makes students clear what they are supposed to do. Since the whole project is organized in a logic manner, the skills learned in one component supplements to the skills learned in other components. Most importantly, the multiple sources provided in the WebQuest enables the students to look at the same thing from various perspectives. This will develop their higher order thinking skill e.g. evaluation, analysis and synthesis.

There are various advantages of using projects and WebQuests in language teaching. First, as the students are given tasks to accomplish with the materials they have to consult, they work themselves to achieve the goal of the task. Second, they communicate with other friends and share their ideas to accomplish the task. Finally, since they present what they did in the classroom project works give a sense of meaningful learning to the students. Moreover, as they have to face some questions from other friends and they have to answer these questions, they learn further and become more confident in doing projects in future.

A project work tends to reject the traditional relationship between teachers and students in which a teacher is considered as authority and the students are as passive recipients. But a project work redefines teachers' role as a facilitator and students as an active participant for the accomplishment of the project. Teachers do not dominate the learning process as it is done in the lecture-based classroom.

Similarly, WebQuests are more organized plans which engage the students in an exploratory learning. WebQuests are important tools for enhancing critical and analytical skills by providing them a chance to discuss on the issues from various perspectives. Since the sources are already given, the students also get chance to link the issues with the issues in their own community.

However, I could see some fundamental issues with projects and WebQuests. First, the selection of texts and projects should be relevant to the level of the students. If the projects are not relevant to the level and contexts of the students, they do not promote learning. Moreover, the objectives of the projects should be specific and achievable. At the same time, sometimes the completion of the projects may undervalue the language learning process, that is, the students may not give focus on the language learning part as they have to focus only on the completion of the task.

Overall, projects and WebQuests encourage the students to learn language in an integrative way i.e. they help to integrate language skills. They also promote learner autonomy through collaboration. Moreover, projects and WebQuests develop discovery and exploratory learning habit of the students.

Happy readings!
Prem