Non-Collaborative Learning

At bottom of this post is my first attempt at making a customized search engine. I'll be using this as part of my online scavenger hunt activity that will be discussed at the end of the entry. (I also expect to be using the customized search engine as part of my 21 Tools!)

While collaborative learning creates an excellent environment for fostering conversation, teamwork, and learning amongst its members, non-collaborative learning --done by the students alone—is still important for fostering independance and personal accountability. This is especially true for younger learners who may lack the skills and knowledge to be successful in other practices like collaboration.  Structure and guidance are still important for students in a non-collaborative setting, as proper instruction and organization will benefit the student in future collaborative and non-collaborative settings. Some of these types of non-collaborative learning include Hotlists, Virtual Tours, Webquests, and Scavenger Hunts. All are designed to give the learner a structured environment while supporting independent research skills to collect information and learn about new topics and concepts.

Webquests are one type of tool designed to help learners use the web to read, collect, and make sense of the new information the find. Developed by the teacher and usually posted on the school or district server, Webquests can provide students with the guidance necessary to navigate the appropriate waters of the World Wide Web while avoiding those parts not beneficial to student learning. Hotlists are another way to provide a focus for research and learning. Simply stated, hotlists are a list of resources--usually websites--that the students can connect to in order to learn more about their topic. Hotlists can be teacher/school created or they can be found in great number with an internet search. When creating hotlists, as with any type of non-collaborative tool, it is important that the teacher checks the quality and timeliness of the sites’ content as well as the connectivity of the link and site with the students’ computers. A Virtual Tour can be used not only to give students a guide for finding specific content but also to aid in learning how to navigate the sites themselves that provide the information. Schools and districts may design virtual tours to help shareholders learn how to access their sites’ content. Teachers may create virtual tours of other websites that students may use for learning. Go to http://nineplanets.org/ to see one example of how a virtual tour is used teach students about the Solar System.

The last of the four non-collaborative tools is the online Scavenger Hunt, and I used this to create an activity that my students could use in the classroom. This was my first attempt at making my own customized search bar, as you can see below. I'll most likely pick that up as one of my 21 tools as it is so helpful for allowing teachers to narrow the breadth of information available on the internet to what is most appropriate for student learning in a given lesson.

These are screen grabs of my PowerPoint presentation. In it I've got three resources linked so that if students use this on the computer they can go directly to the sites. Otherwise, I'll have them available in their bookmark/favorites tab to access. By giving them assignments like this scavenger hunt, I can provide opportunities for students to explore the World Wide Web to research information and seek answers to their questions while giving the focus by removing a lot of internet content that could distract their learning. As students get more adept at these activities, I can broaden the number of websites available to them so they can practice the skill of determining importance in internet content for themselves.

Citations:

WebQuests: Explanation. (n.d.). Retrieved July 6, 2015, from http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/webquests/index.html

Hot Lists for Teachers. (n.d.). Retrieved July 7, 2015, from http://educ-calvin2.lsu.edu/~lsuctp/lrce_hotlists.htm

Get Outta Class With Virtual Field Trips. (n.d.). Retrieved July 5, 2015, from http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech071.shtml

Education World: Internet Scavenger Hunts. (n.d.). Retrieved July 7, 2015, from http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/archives/scavenger_hunt.shtml

Fact Monster™ from Information Please ®. (n.d.). Retrieved July 6, 2015, from http://www.factmonster.com

Nine Planets - Solar System Tour. (n.d.). Retrieved July 6, 2015, from http://nineplanets.org/
Earth. (n.d.). Retrieved July 7, 2015, from https://www.google.com/earth/

Here is my customized search bar. Feel free to give it a try!