[3rd] Learn form one of the Best WebQuest : Persuasive Speaking

WebQuest is an activity where most information used by learners is drawn from the web. Here I found one of the best WebQuest to teach persuasive speaking! And this WebQuest could serve as an excellent example for guide teachers to design a WebQuest. I hope everyone can see this WebQuest! This is the link: 🔗 http://questgarden.com/68/00/2/080716182031/process.htm.

1. what is this activity? (evaluate it from several aspects)

 This WebQuest is a website to help students in grades 6-8 practice their oral English through debate after reading the novel hoot.  Let's see why it's so great!

Engaging opening

The hook mentioned at the beginning is very life-oriented and directly mentions that students benefit from this task. It first asks students to imagine a scene they may encounter in life: they want to go to their friend's house for the night but are rejected by their parents. Then he mentioned that after completing today's task, students could learn how to persuade others and benefit from it. Such two steps can catch students' attention instantly. 

The question/ task

On the whole, the instructions of WebQuest are obvious and fully exercise students' cognitive ability. In completing the task, students are first asked to do some research. After understanding the background by researching, students need to summarise all the information, choose their arguments and give reasons for third arguments. At the same time, students also need to judge which argument is more robust and which is weaker. This exercises students' ability to summarise, compare, analyse and give reasons, which helps students exercise their cognition when learning English.

Background for everyone 

Before starting the actual debate, the students were assigned to different groups to read and fill in the forms provided by the teacher. These articles are from the novel hoot, which helps students understand the background knowledge of the debate topic. At the same time, the teacher also provides some websites that are helpful for debate. Students can learn basic debate skills by entering these websites. We can see that it provides many resources to help students learn. 

Roles( this is my favourite part.)

Students are assigned different roles and have different tasks during the debate. And these tasks are not repeated. For example, the opener is responsible for opening the debate topic. The questioner is responsible for providing reasons for the main points of view and challenging the opponent’s points of view. By completing different tasks and corresponding forms, each student can take independent responsibility and have a fixed time to speak in the debate. This ensures that they can fully participate in the debate and practise their oral English. 

Although their tasks are different, they also need to cooperate. For example, the questioner needs to support the opener’s views, while the closer needs to summarise the views of all his teammates. This part fully gives students independent exercise and opportunities to practise oral English and promotes their cooperation.

Real-world feedback. 

 The students were analysed and evaluated from four aspects. This evaluates their ability to help demonstrate their views through body language, their language flow, and whether they can support their views through their own experience. However, these aspects are limited to their performance in the debate. Maybe the evaluation of students' teamwork ability and ability to do research can be added.

The conclusion of this WebQuest

At the end of this WebQuest, the benefits of completing the task are also mentioned. Students can exercise their ability to express their views and provide reasons. Such ability may be used in future groups and society. At the same time, it also emphasises that the students also exercised their ability to use technical means to conduct information investigation. This end is closely related to the previous introduction, emphasising the significance and importance of this task.

2. Limitations of the question

Some instructions need to be more apparent. For example, when the teacher asked the students to summarise their arguments and write a form,  he used an example seen in the figure below. This example about the bubble gum ban has nothing to do with the subject of the debate. At first, it confused me. Later, I understood that this was just an example of the format. The content of the table can be some simple arguments of their debate. This will make it easier for students to understand. 

 In general, this WebQuest provides a good teaching template to teach speaking. More teachers can use such a template, and only a few minor changes are needed. This has some inspiration for the teaching of other teachers.