Let's Get Started!

How exciting! Today was our first day in the computer lab with the students. Because I am a Teacher Librarian this year, I don't have my own classes. Working with Cynthia Kiefer's senior English classes is going to be fun. I already know many of the students in both period 3 and period 7--some are my former students, and some I know from the library.

Cynthia and I met last week to plan the steps of the research project. The class has already taken a survey about what they think they do when they research and about their use of technology in general. Also, on the day before our October break, the classes brainstormed topics related to the research project (election issues like the economy, abortion, war on terrorism, etc.). Today, Cynthia told them that they would have time to just search the web to find possible websites for topics of interest to them. We gave them a log and told them to write down (a) the search term(s) they used, the url for each site they visited, title of site, and whether or not they thought it was a valuable site for future research. Basically, we wanted them to slow down their searching, evaluate sites, and just get a sense of what is out there for their topics.

Many of the 3rd hour students immediately referred to their Writer's Notebooks to look at the topics list and used a topic from the list as their search term. They were very quick to Google and find sites on their topics of interest. One group of three worked together in the back; one of the girls knew a site called "On the Issues," and went right to that site rather than use Google. When her friends saw the site, they immediately went there as well. The three spent a lot of time debating many of the topics as they looked at the link on the site, exchanging ideas and asking each other questions. I listened, then mentioned that we'd like them to write the information on their logs. The boy in the group asked, "What's the difference between .org and .com? Is there even a difference?" as he listed a url. The girl told him that .org was an organization, and then asked me what an organization was. I explained, and then we looked at which organization published the website she was persuing--it was AARP. So I asked her why it would matter to know which organization published a site--she was able to identify that organizations may or may not have a particular bias. The boy listened the whole time, then said, "So what about .com?" We then discussed "commercial" and the possible bias related to that as well.

A few things come to mind through this conversation. First, one of my concerns with this research is about students and collaboration. When we began this research, I asked Cynthia how technology could promote collaboration--it seemed like sitting at a computer doing research would be so isolating. But today, in both period 3 and period 7, I watched students researching and collaborating the entire time, whether it was to help each other find information, or to discuss the information they were reading. Also, as in the conversation above, students were actually teaching each other the information they needed to know to be smart consumers of information on the Internet. On the other hand, this also shows that all students are not as aware of how to intelligently consume the information. I usually do teach a lesson on the difference between .com, .org, .edu, and .gov, but this was a more natural way for the student to learn--out of necessity and while actually using the information.

The 7th hour class was definitely a contrast to 3rd hour. While there was a great deal of interaction and conversation among the students, very few students were actually writing anything down on their logs. Very few took out their Writer's Notebooks for reference, either. I also noticed that many of the kids who were not writing down information were really not looking at many websites, either. They were using one site's links as a launching pad (Presidental election.com, I think) to research a topic, but returning back to the same homepage. The students were clearly engaged, arguing, debating, questioning--they just didn't want to write anything on paper. Even when both Kiefer and I tried to redirect and point out that they would use the log to find their actual information, many still wrote nothing down. A few students, rather than "surf" for multiple websites, preferred to read in detail on one or two pages.

So, we really saw a variety of behaviors, but the question is, how much did the log and the writing influence/change student research behavior? Would the students have visited as many websites if they didn't have the log to fill in (though none filled in every line)? Is it more natural to just read a few, which limits possiblities? Will this encourage students to look beyond the first few "hits" on their topic and seek more information and perspectives? Also, the students in 7th hour who didn't write anythng in the log--will they have weaker information than those who did peruse more sites as preliminary research? And most of all, how do we motivate these students to take the entire research assignment and its parts seriously?!

Another perspective on this entire topic: how will blogging change my reflection practices? When I tried to keep a notebook, I rarely wrote my reflections down. However, today I couldn't wait to write this blog. There's certainly something more motivational about this for me.