Research On Web Quest Web-based Inquiry Learning

A WebQuest is a web-based inquiry-oriented activity. Its goal is for help the student to carry on (he high level the thought and the inference, uses the information to solve the problem. The Web brings the revolutionary change to the education nowadays; WebQuest has become one kind of popular form that uses web-resources to carry on the Inquiry learning. But there are not many researches on the design of a WebQuest, which is an important reason that the current WebQuest implementary condition is not especially ideal. There are only some principles and guidelines for the design of a WebQuest, and there are no systematical and exercisable design methods. To solve this problem, it's very necessary to put forward a set of systematical and exercisable WebQuest design methods. The thesis, using the new instruction design theory to direct WebQuest instruction design, provide WebQuest instruction design module, and the analysis of each phase, put the new instruction design theory into the practice, also leave the WebQuest instruction design to a new level of systematic theory.The research question came from real practice, and the problem was also solved in practice. And the goal of this study was to improve the design and implementation of WebQuests. The main research method in this study was action research.At first, I analyzed the definitions of WebQuest, and then I defined WebQuest as a web-based inquiry-learning model. I also analyzed the character, theoretical foundation, basic idea of WebQuests, which was very important for the clarification of the vague understandings about WebQuest.In this thesis, I reflected on my former experiences on the design and implementation of WebQuest activities. In addition, I also did in-depth investigation about the existing WebQuests on the web. Based on my findings, I put forward a set of WebQuest instructional design methods, then, I designed and implemented a WebQuest "THUNDERSTORM-Opera of CaoYu". At last with K-12 teachers and the student questionnaire, it's proved that this set of WebQuest instruction design methods were effective and feasible.This set of design methods related the theory with the practice, and were of great help for K-12 teachers to design and implement their own WebQuests.