Teacher Process
I plan on using 45 minutes of class time for a two week period to finish this unit. My school has laptops available that I will sign out for each day. Hopefully they will all be charged and ready to go. If you only have one computer available for each group, you will have to have other sources of research available for the students; perhaps a trip to the school library prior and during the unit will be necessary, along with updated classroom encyclopedias. I might also consider writing to organizations related to ocean science for more information.
I will introduce the topic by having the students brainstorm individually everything that they know about the oceans on a piece of paper to be handed in to me so that I can have a baseline of prior knowledge. Then I would have them sit in groups for a few minutes to share what they know with each other prior to a classroom discussion. During this time I will begin to find out what questions they may have and getting them thinking more about the ocean. This should take about 20 minutes (I'll read their brainstorming notes later) and then I will introduce them to the webquest.
While they are working their way through their missions, I will be spending time with groups and individuals. I also plan on having impromptu mini-sessions with students who are studying similar topics in different oceans so they can compare their findings.
Along with learning about the oceans, I am hoping that my students will learn how the internet could be used as a resource and become more familiar with this media. I want them to learn to take responsibility for their own learning, as well as supporting the learning of others. I suspect that some of the students will have very strong opinions about the plight of endangered sea life and the causes of the danger to these animals.
I believe that this webquest is formatted in a way that is easy to adapt to different processes. For instance, you may want your students to learn to use power points; they can be easily adapted for either of their presentations. Geographical information can be shown professionally by using a spreadsheet type program. The use of graphing can lead into an interdisciplinary unit with math.
I hope this has been useful to you and that you and your class will enjoy this webquest!