Teaching English Toolbox - OPEN ACCESS SANDBOX

Researching or Copy-Pasting?

Friday the 13th ©PHZH (L. Buechel)

This image was the bellringer for a lesson on superstitions in a fourth grade. The lesson followed the following general procedure:

  1. Students sorted the ideas into two groups - as a class they repeated the words, said what was good luck and bad luck.
  2. Students added their own ideas and what other things they knew to be good and bad luck.
  3. Each student chose one superstition. On paper, they wrote down questions to research such as "What is the history behind...." or "Where does the superstition....come from?" and other questions. The teacher corrected their questions.
  4. Students then had 10 minutes on the computers to type in their searches and to take notes to answer the questions. 
  5. On a half piece of paper, they wrote the superstition and some interesting facts. They shared these in small groups.
  6. The following lessons were based on reading the story "The Monkey's Paw" (easy reader version).

If you want your learners to do research in English, think about the following questions:

  • How do you ensure that this becomes a language learning opportunity and not a copy-paste or translation activity? 
  • How do you teach learners to identify credible sources in an English lesson?
  • What websites do you know of that are safe for learners to use to do research?
  • What note-taking strategies do you know of (on paper or digitally) that help avoid copy-pasting?
  • If you want your learners to do research and DO something with the research, then what products might be useful for English lessons and how can learners share with one another so that they learn from one another?
  • If different learners do different things, then how can you use any research-related product for grading? How can you assess reading through research and not just writing or speaking?