1121 Annotated Bibliography 1

1. Citation details:
Ikpeze, C. H., & Boyd, F. B. (2007). Web-based inquiry learning: Facilitating
thoughtful literacy with WebQuests. The Reading Teacher, 60(7), 644-654.
https://doi.org/10.1598/RT.60.7.5

2. Summary
 Research purpose:
The article discusses the use and effectiveness of WebQuests as a tool for
facilitating thoughtful literacy and inquiry-based learning.
 Methodology:
The methodology of this article involved using WebQuests to teach students
about pollution and critical reading. Students were asked to work in pairs to
evaluate websites using a set of guiding questions and to criticize advertisements
in different mass media. Assessment was ongoing throughout the teaching period
and was focused on the goal of instruction and on students’ developmental stage,
and an evaluation rubric was used to quantify students’ performance in all
activities. Data collection and analyses were done using the action research
paradigm.
 Results:
The results showed that WebQuests are a natural way to teach literacy and
technology skills simultaneously by immersing students in an authentic problem-
solving situation. Findings from this study suggest that WebQuests can facilitate
thoughtful literacy when tasks are carefully selected, organized, and delivered.
Multiple tasks could be used to provide opportunities for collaboration, thoughtful
connections, and critical reading. Such tasks increased students’ engagement and
motivation as well as built search, retrieval, multimedia, and hypertext reading
skills.
 Conclusion:
The conclusion of this article is that WebQuests are a learning tool that
teachers can use to implement thematic and interdisciplinary teaching. WebQuests
are a learning tool that could help students acquire thoughtful literacy through
activities that nurture creative and imaginative thinking and opportunity to
demonstrate higher order thinking skills through explanations, discussions, and
reflections. However, teachers using WebQuests may face new challenging roles
as they are expected to scaffold students’ learning within a more complex learning
environment. In order to maximize the benefits of WebQuests, we need to address
some of the challenges that might arise when using this instructional tool.
3. Connection
The article provides me with the evidence of the effectiveness of WebQuests in
promoting thoughtful literacy, and highlighting the challenges that teachers may face
when using this instructional tool. I have gained insights to address these challenges,
such as incorporating Internet and computer literacy instruction, reducing cognitive
barriers, and making reflection an integral part of students’ learning. Since the article
has mentioned how students’ reading literacy could be improved, I would like to shift
the focus of my research question to “To what extent WebQuest impacts EFL learners’
learning motivation” instead of discussing the influence on learners’ reading literacy.