Using the Internet for Learning

NB: We do not resell your papers. Upon ordering, we do an original paper exclusively for you.

NB: All your data is kept safe from the public.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Lessons plans for using the internet for education
Conclusions
References

Introduction

According to a report by PEW, the Internet has become increasingly used in teaching and the learning environment. The report surveyed 754 teenagers and found that about 94% of them use the Internet for help with their homework and to complete assignments. About 71% have admitted to using content from the web to complete their school projects. However, the study reported that teachers spend very little effort in directing teens in the correct way of using the Internet and very few of them spare any effort to develop a program for utilization of the Internet for classes (Lenhart, 2007). This paper provides a design of a unit of instruction that makes use of the Internet in a variety of ways. The paper has presented a number of plans for using the Internet for learning.

Lessons plans for using the internet for education

Several ideas for developing Internet learning are provided in this section. The main intention in framing lesson plans is to teach students about writing effectively, how to perform research on different themes and how to use the information to write in their language (intute, 2008).

Starting a discussion form with Yahoo Groups

Yahoo groups are a very effective manner in which students can be taught to use discussion forums. At some point in time in the future, as the children grow up, they would be joining some type of group or the other. The good thing about Yahoo groups is that it allows the teacher or the moderator to allow only people they want, to join the group. In this way, the group would have restricted access and outsiders would not be allowed. Many leading professionals such as engineers, doctors, IT professionals, and others have formed special interest groups on Yahoo (Yahoo, 2008).

Formation of the group on Yahoo can be the starting point for Internet learning. The teacher can serve as a moderator initially. Email Ids of all students should be first collected and if they do not have yahoo Ids, they must be asked to create one. A group can then be formed and invitations should be sent to all the students so that they can subscribe to the groups. Certain ground rules should be formed and acts such as spamming, flaming, and other such antisocial acts should not be allowed.

Using email effectively

The idea here is to use email as an effective writing tool. In this lesson, an attempt would be made to teach students to write effective emails. The Yahoo group is already created and ready for use. To start with, the teacher can first think of asking the students to send a mail to the group based on any current topic. The students should be told that they could only send one email and replying to the mail is not allowed. The children should be told about the importance of the subject line, how to introduce the subject, and so on till the final mail is completed and checked with a word processor. Students should be given a day and all mail should be sent within this deadline. The idea here is that students can see for themselves how to write emails, how others have written, and how to avoid mistakes.

Using Discussion Forums such as Yahoo Groups

Using the created Yahoo group, the teacher should present a topic for discussion. It could be some topic related to the class or a general topic. Subjects from American history are also good for discussion topics. There should be a word limit of say 300 and students should give their points of view on this topic. Even professionals use such discussion forums.

Using the Internet to create a picture book

A good way to use the Internet is to create a scrapbook of pictures about a certain theme by using images from the net. The theme could be anyone such as dinosaur history, pictures of native Indians, great figures from the American war of Independence, and so on. Students should be asked to submit a softcopy as well as a hard copy. Since copying pictures from the Internet and pasting them in a word document requires some skills, this becomes additional learning. Along with each picture, students should give the proper citation and a brief description of the image in less than 100 words. They should be told to write using their own words and not copy-paste from the net. The above exercise will teach them to use Google along with the right keywords, increase their writing skills and teach them how to write briefly and concisely.

Using Online Newspaper reports

Online newspapers have become good sources of information and almost all the major newspapers have a website that gives brief news items along with articles and stories. The teacher should give a topic that occurred some time back and ask students to prepare a report using five different sources. As an additional condition, the write-up from each source should not be more than 200 words, it should not be copy-pasted and the article must be cited as per proper citation methods. This exercise will help students to read online newspapers, understand them properly and teach them to write a summary of the findings.

Using the Internet to learn about cultures and religions

The teacher should now attempt to teach students how to research and write about different cultures, using the Internet. Certain guidelines for the structure of the document should be an introduction about the culture, origins, and country or region, current practices, beliefs and gods they worship, and so on. In the end, the students should make a table that compares these cultures. The theme could be about religions, languages, customs, and so on. This plan would help students in researching different parts of the world. The Yahoo group can be used to send messages and share documents.

Writing about Blogs

Having the children create their blogs is a very good idea but this should be discussed with the parents and the principal since the blog is available for the public and unsocial elements can gain access and correspond with the children and this is dangerous. However, students should be given an exercise to find at least five blogs on different topics such as automobiles, healthcare, economy, IT, and so on. The students should then provide a report on the type of blog, who the authors are, what topics are discussed, and so on.

Finding websites on specific themes

It would be a good idea to ask students to research websites based on different themes such as green energy, automobiles, sports cars, history, food, travel, and so on. Such an exercise would help students to learn how to search for content-specific websites, learn how to judge the sites, and write a report about them. The students should also be asked to take a screenshot and paste an image in a word document and describe what the site gives and how it compares to other sites selected in the theme.

Writing about TV and radio sites

Many TV broadcasting sites such as BBC, CNN, Fox News, and others have dedicated websites where they give details of what they are going to telecast or relay. Students should be asked to pick up one or two sites and write a report on the program schedule for a week or even two or three days of the week. Students can be given alternate days of the week so that there is variety in the reporting. The report should not mention just the program but describe the programs in fifty words. This lesson would help students to learn about TV websites and how they plan programs. The same can be done for online radio stations such as Yahoo and reports about different music genres that are hosted there can be given. The lesson would help students to learn about online media.

Finding Movie clips about cartoons

Students should be asked to find an online cartoon movie clip about any of their favorite characters. Where possible, students can download the movie clip and where the download is not possible, they can give a link to the movie clip. The report should mention the website where the clip is hosted, what other content is available on the site, comments on the clip such as what the story is about, and so on. Such an exercise would help students to learn about online movie clips, how to report about them and how the clips are placed on the website concerning the overall content.

Special Characters Research

Each student should be asked to perform research about a historical character such as Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Julius Caesar, and so on and write a report of 500 words about them. Students should be told to use reputed websites and not to copy-paste but write in their own words. Certain guidelines such as brief introduction, the period when the character lived, country, his achievements and contribution to history, and other facts along with a few pictures should be given. This is a very important area for research and in later life; students would be expected to perform research using the same methods.

Conclusions

The paper has presented a number of lesson plans that teachers can use to teach students on using the Internet effectively in their studies. The lessons are designed in such a way that they would help the student to realize the importance and method of writing proper emails, how to participate in discussion forums and how to write effectively. Later lesson plans are designed to teach students how to perform research using the Internet and how to write reports without plagiarism and by giving citations. These lessons would help the students even in their later life when they grow up and enter college or take up work.

References

intute, 2008. Internet for education.
Lenhart Amanda. Simon Maya. 2007. The Internet and Education: Findings of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Pew Internet & American Life Project, Washington, DC, USA.
Yahoo, 2008. Creating Yahoo Groups.

Click Here To Order Now!