Supporting Information Literacy and Online Inquiry in the Classroom: A Reflection

The greatest revelation that occurred to me while taking this course is that an online inquiry project can be completed by everyone, even second graders. Entering this course, I felt that being a second grade teacher would bring a disadvantage to the table seeing that many second grade students have limited computing experience, making an online inquiry project something too complex for them to complete. While planning out my unit plan, I discovered that through many of the organizers supplied in our course text, Reading the Web: Strategies for Online Inquiry by Eagleton and Dobler, online inquiry projects can be completed by my second graders. There were primary organizers designed for each step along the way that I can use to assess the learning of new literacies while projects are being complete.

In addition, I now realize all the new learning that goes on during an online inquiry project. Even something as basic choosing the appropriate search engine is a skill my students will need to know for future success. This course has taught me that each step in an online inquiry project has its own unique "new literacies" for students to master and for teachers to assess.

Through all these discoveries, I was able to design an inquiry based lesson plan in which I have already utilized in my classroom. My one professional goal is to expand this lesson next year. Through the use of Safari Montage, a communication and presentation tool, I plan on having my students share their "how to" projects on a more public and global scale. Instead of presenting their projects to the classroom, they will present them to a classroom at our neighboring elementary school through the live video sharing capabilities of Safari Montage. Throughout the remainder of the year, I plan on designing a series of mini-lessons to teach students how to use it, in order for them, as well as myself to become more comfortable with the software. Next year, as I am more experienced with the software, I plan on taking my class's "how-to" projects to the next level, thus teaching even more "new literacies" to my students for their success in the 21st century workplace.