Lesson for Students: Expertise on WikiHow
As an ambassador (http://www.wordcentral.com/) of your country, culture, and language here in the United States, you have certain areas of expertise that others do not have. We have been brainstorming some of those things in class, and now it’s time to share your knowledge.
1. First, open an internet browser and go to www.wikihow.com
2. Second, use your mouse to click in the middle box on the blue words that say “Write a how to.”
3. Then, enter a title that clearly describes your task.
4. Next, the computer will list some similar articles. Scroll down to the bottom of the list and select “None of these are duplicates. I am ready to create the article!” Select “Next.”
5. Fifth, write your hook in the “Introduction” section.
6. Then, 2rite your directions in the “Steps” section. Be sure to use numbers and sequencing words (first, second, then, next, etc.) to help your reader follow the directions.
7. Next, put a key phrase in the “Summary” section.
8. Finally, click on the “Publish” key to publish your work.
Review of Lesson and Website Resource
How will you use this resource to meet the needs of your instructional purposes?
This lesson will meet the needs of my instructional purposes on a variety of levels. First of all, it fits with my instructional objective of teaching students sequencing transition words. As modeled in the student directions, the students will be using the sequencing words and ordinal numbers to organize their information.
This activity appears to be a low-level writing activity because the students are writing simple sentences to describe a familiar task. The focus and clarity of those sentences, however, when correctly written will show a mastery of command verbs and appropriate word choice.
Why is this application and format appropriate for the lesson you plan to create (e.g., level of authenticity, relevance to target language, register, accuracy, interest level, and motivation)?
This activity is high interest for students because it allows them to share an area of expertise, read about fellow students’ interests and cultures, and be officially “published” on the internet. It is an easy way to show students that they have something of worth to share in the written word.
What handouts or directions will you provide students to focus learning
and adapt this resource for your instructional resources?
The electronic publication of this activity will be a culmination of prior work in the classroom. We will explore other wikihow.com articles to look for commonalities and to discuss what makes a set of directions easy or difficult to follow.
We will use a graphic organizer to focus the task. We will also work with peers to act out the directions to make sure that nothing is assumed in the process of giving directions.
When the students finally come to the computer lab for this assignment, they will have their organized thoughts ready to type including a “hook” sentence, their list of directions, and a list of brainstormed sequencing words.
Are the format, organization, design and language level of this resource appropriate for your instructional goals?
Wikihow is a very user-friendly format for students and adults alike. There do not seem to be any obvious language hurdles to this assignment.
Lindsey, I like this assignment. I am assuming that students have already had a lesson on ordinal numbers and ordering words. I know that my intermediate students would require a minilesson just on these things before a how to writing. I clicked on the links provided and they were easy to get to and your directions seem concise.
ReplyDeleteAre students supposed to choose to continue with their how to writing even if their topic is a duplicate? Your directions state to click on that none are duplicate, but what if their topic is a duplicate of something else on the site? In my experience, when students do writing, they often times have similar topics. With a website available to many people, chances are the topics our ELL's choose will be a duplicate. Will this be a problem? For example, I typed in "how to draw a horse" and this was a duplicate, which would I click, continue with my writing, or choose another topic. If students need to choose a topic that is not duplicated, this could add a lot of time to the lesson.
Hi Lindsay,
ReplyDeleteYour directions and those on www.wikihow.com are very easy to follow. I've also done direction writing with my students. Usually I'll introduce it by having someone explain to me how to do something and I'll act it out, taking advantage of things they've left out. It can be hilarious! (Put the jar of peanut butter on the bread!) Your idea of having students act out each other's directions is a nice variation on this to point out the importance of specificity. A question I have is: Will the students have sequencing words posted in the classroom or in their journals to refer to? That may be helpful, especially with your younger students. Even though you mentioned they'd be writing in simple sentences, the cognitive load is rigorous as I think writing directions is very difficult. Nice work!