Introduction
For today's Genius Hour, you'll complete a WebQuest that will ultimately show you how to research efficiently for information that is most valuable to you and your topic. Researching entails more skills than just typing a couple words into Google and clicking "search." For today's WebQuest, you won't have to ACTIVE read an article or complete the Student Self-Assessment form. Instead, you're going to create an About page that introduces the most interesting information and insights about your topic.
Imagine that you're about to walk into an interview in hopes that the Dean will accept you into the university. The Dean and you sift through the usual information, such as your GPA and ACT scores plus extracurricular activities. Finally, the Dean asks you what creative and innovative endeavors prove that you are unlike any of the other hundred students that he has to interview. The Dean asks the ultimate question: "What makes you different?"
Task
At the university interview, the Dean asks you what creative and innovative endeavors prove that you are unlike any of the other hundred students that he has to interview. The Dean has asked you, "What makes you different?"
In your "About" page on your student blog, explain how you would answer the Dean's question:
- What subject area or interest you are passionate about
- Why that subject / interest is intriguing and insightful
- What different perspectives and/or driving questions you offer to the field
- What you would like to see change or evolve in the field
- What further information you would like to learn.
Process
To effectively articulate your answer to the Dean's question, you will visit the following websites in this WebQuest to not only help you find your answer but also generate your individual thoughts about your interest. Each of these resources gives you information that will continue to help you throughout all of the Genius Hour Project and into college.
While visiting each of the Websites, complete the handout given at the beginning of class to organize your thoughts and collect your information. At the end of the period, you will turn in the completed handout. If you do not finish the WebQuest and/or assignment, then it will be homework due by next Genius Hour.
- Purdue Owl: Searching with a Search Engine -- Complete the organizer on the handout. First, indentify the various Boolean search terms and summarize how each search term affects your search. Then, apply the Boolean search to your Genius Hour topic to create your own, personal examples per Boolean search term.
- Evaluating Web Pages: UC Berkeley -- List the five key questions that you need to ask when you encounter a web page that is not familiar to you. Because the Internet is so vast and easily manipulated, there is an abundance of misinformation on the world wide web. Therefore, you need to protect your integrity by questioning other's integrity, i.e. the web pages where you grab information.
- Young People are the Geniuses who Change the World -- Make a connection to the statistics Maiers states in the beginning of her blog post. Then, identify which one of the young people mentioned in the article had the most interesting story and briefly explain why.
- TED Talks -- On the TED homepage, move your cursor over the menu bar and hover over the word "WATCH." Then, select "Topic" and browse through the videos. Every student in our class should be able to find a TED Talk that relates to his or her topic. While watching the video, write down three (3) Eureka! moments or Emotional responses that you had during the TED Talk.
When you are done, return to your Student Blog and, while using the information you've gathered the past few weeks and today, create an "About" page for your Student Blog. For this task, you'll select to create a page instead of the usual post.