Big Chalk is a popular educational site. One of its services is send emails to teacher about 8 Educational Sites, WOW sites, or Tech Support Sites. These letters offered teachers, parents, and students new ways to use the web. In the December 2002 Tech email, Big Chalk discussed Web Scavenger Hunts.

Idea #1: Scavenger Hunts

Wade Oliver, an educator at Monroeville Elementary School in Monroeville, IN, creates online scavenger hunts centered on popular topics (like dinosaurs) to bolster his students' Web mining skills.

Students read each question, click on a Web link containing the answer, then type out their findings and submit them to Oliver -- all through their Web browsers. Each question is worth 10 extra credit points, and spelling counts. Here's a short excerpt:

1. What the three types of rocks are most likely to contain dinosaur fossils?
Site #1

2. During what period of time were most of the dinosaurs discovered that appear in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History? What years cover this time period?
Site #2

3. In April 1984, Parrsboro, Nova Scotia fossil collector Eldon George uncovered some of the world's smallest dinosaur footprints. How big were the footprints he discovered?
Site#3

Don't be discouraged if you don't know how to make a scavenger hunt Web page like Oliver's. Instead, type out your questions, including related Web links, in a word-processing document that you can print and hand out. Students can email you the answers or fill out the assignment on paper and hand it in the old-fashioned way.

Another way to increase the learning value of your online scavenger hunts is to require students to find answers to your questions without the aid of preselected Web links. This will both increase the amount of time required to complete the assignment and guarantee that a wider array of sources will be tapped to obtain the answers. (Be sure to require students to include links to the Web pages that helped them answer each question.)

Here are some sample questions from a history teacher at Davis Senior High School, California:

1. The Industrial Revolution (1835-1900) was a time of many inventions. Thus, it was a time that many patents were issued. Go to the U.S. Patent Office page and find five significant patents issued during the Industrial Revolution. You may choose any month, just be sure to let me know the date and the object patented.

2. Immigration also increased tremendously in the period following the American Civil War. But immigration patterns changed around 1890. Discuss how immigration changed with respect to the following: (a) reasons for immigration, (b) who the immigrants were, and (c) methods of transportation and ports of arrival. Remember, you will need to compare two periods to complete this part of the assignment.

3. Unions also developed during the Industrial Revolution as a way to combat the excesses of owners. One famous strike was the Pullman Strike. Summarize the causes, events and consequences of this strike.

Looking for a set of existing educational Internet hunts? Dive into this growing collection, organized by educator Cindy O'Hora.

Dozens more can be found here, arranged by grade level.