In his article, Thomas March begins with that the change of the World Wide Web during the last decades should be considered when dealing with WebQuests and therefore he claims it is necessary to revisit WebQuests and their components.
Before he analyses changes, he states that a scaffolding structure that encourages student motivation and advanced thinking with integration of enriched learning resources is still the core element that forms a part of every WebQuest.
The change in the World Wide Web to a concept called “Web 2.0″ has the effect that there are not only text pages but multiple possibilities to express oneself online. For educational purposes this means that there is a wide range of opportunities to use in school but, as we already learned, that it is not always easy to distinguish the good from the bad and when it comes to research, pupils must be aware of the fact that anyone can post anything on the internet. Here, WebQuests can be a good exercise to cope with the internet and so March comes to a first conclusion: “WebQuests can serve as a framework to integrate Web 2 into school learning.”
Further on, March looks at other Web 2.0 applications like blogs and wikis and here, too, discovers advantages (free use, creative writing, intrinsic motivation) and disadvantages (in part tend to be too traditional).
In his conclusion, March points out that the popularity of WebQuests shows that their use in schools is legitimate. Additionally, he advises to watch carefully at the further development of WebQuests and other applications in the course of Web 2.0.
As far as I can see, March is right in saying that the World Wide Web and its educational opportunities changed a lot during the past decades. I find it important to emphasize the potential risks as well as the educational benefits, which as he says “outweigh the challenges”.
