The scavenger hunt is a good way to introduce a Web site, as it requires students to explore and search for answers.

Planning for a scavenger hunt is simple. The teacher determines what is important to know in order to use the site effectively and get students interested. Questions are chosen or designed to obtain the desired information. Like all scavenger hunts, the student is asked to go out and find small things, in this case pieces of information, but the process of getting that information is the real lesson.

The sample questions start the student thinking about:

a. What information can one find on MY HERO?

b. How is that information generally organized?

c. What are the main navigation elements?

d. How are the stories organized?

e. What are the standard parts of every story?

f. What kind of variety exists in the story content?

(e.g., Where are the stories from? Who writes them? Why are people recognized as heroes? What kinds of things are important to heroes? What value choices do heroes make?)

Your Scavenger Hunt can be simple or extensive based on the amount of computer time available.

Students with minimal reading or Internet skills can be guided through the process, using simpler stories and questions.

Choose stories in which the content illustrates that MY HERO is a global Internet project, featuring heroes around the world from all walks of life. Encourage students to join this international community by submitting their own hero stories.

Objectives:

Students will develop an understanding of the purpose and content of the MY HERO Website.

They will learn how the hero stories are organized and how to access information on the site.

To motivate students to contribute their own stories to the MY HERO Web site.

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Resources/Materials:

Access to enough Internet-connected computers to comfortably accommodate your class.

Teacher-developed handout of questions about the MY HERO website for students to answer.

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Activities and Procedures:

Step One: Preparing the Handout of Questions

Create a form with space for short answers to questions about the main elements and content of the MY HERO site. Use your own questions or choose from the following to get started. Note that some questions are very basic and the answers easily found, while others require actually scanning or reading stories for the answers.

Adapt the level of questions to match your students’ computer literacy skills.

Choose the number of questions based on the amount of time you have to spend on the computer looking for the answers.

Choose a mix of easy-to-answer questions and ones that require scanning or reading stories to find the answers.

SAMPLE QUESTIONS:

A. General information questions:

• What is the URL of the home page?
• Does the site have a motto, and if so, what is it? (answer: Anyone can be a hero!)
• List ALL of the links on the home page.
• How many search engines can be accessed from the home page? (answer: 2)
  •  How are they different?
• What elements do all hero stories have in common? (answer: category of hero, name of hero, author of story, credits, related links, other heroes in the same category)
• What is the Create link for, and who can use it? (answer: to upload your story onto the MY HERO Website and create your own Web page honoring your hero; anyone can use it)
• What are the first two boxes you need to fill in to sign the Guestbook?
• What are the main categories of heroes?

B. Specific content questions

• In what category of hero can you find:
  • Sherlock Holmes (answer: literary)
  • Dorothea Lange (answer: artist)
  • Sylvia Earle (answer: explorer)
  • Ray Anderson (answer: business)
  • Olara Otunnu (answer: lifesaver)
• What hero did Annmarie Williams write about in the Guestbook? What are the names of the two organizations her hero founded? (answer: Her hero, Craig Kielberger founded Free the Children and Leaders Today, organizations devoted to children’s rights.)
• What is the title of the story written by AP Newswriter Coralie Carlson about some rescued and released mammals? (answer: "Rescued Pilot Whales Released")
• According to the mission statement, how does MY HERO make a profit? (answer: It doesn’t. It’s a not-for-profit project.)
• Who wrote the Forum essay, “How Do We Choose Our Heroes?” (answer: The Reverend Charles F. Harper; Note: the student must go to the Forum page first, then find the “Previous Forum Topic” link at the bottom of the page.)
• Give a quote from Mattie Stepanek.
• What movie is based on the life of Ron Kovic? To whom did he address a speech on July 15, 1976?
• Who is Aung San Suu Kyi and why has she been in jail?
• Who is Kofi Annan and what is the URL of his Website? (answer: Secretary General of the United Nations, http://www.un.org/News/ossg/sg/)
• What country is Ibrahim Alex Bangura from and what is he trying to do?

C. Open-ended questions that aren’t part of the Hunt:

• Look at one category and list three stories that you’d like to read and why they interest you.
• Follow your interests to three stories and record the name and category of the hero and why they are considered a hero.
• List the names of interesting heroes you find as you explore the site.

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Step Two: The Hunt is On!

Students log on to www.myhero.com and search for the answers to the Scavenger Hunt questions, filling in the handout as they go along.

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Step Three: Discussing the answers

You can have a straightforward question/answer session or you can turn it into a game as follows: (The game requires that there be more questions in the Scavenger Hunt, so that every student in the class has an opportunity to answer at least one question.)

If you have Internet-connected computers in the room, open up the MY HERO website. Otherwise you may want to copy several MY HERO pages to show the class what the pages contain and how the site is used. The most useful pages to copy include the home page, the main pages for Search, Create and the Directory, along with a sample story.

A. Number students 1-2-3-4, and have them divide into groups.

B. Ask each group in turn, calling on a different person in that group each time, to read the answer they found to a specific question. If the answer is correct, group gets 1 point.

If the answer is incorrect and no one else in the group can answer the question, it goes to the next group. Whichever group answers the question correctly gets the point. After the correct answer has been given, discuss why there was a problem arriving at the answer, highlighting the process the winning individual went through to find the correct answer.

C. The team with the most points wins. To reward the winning team, use the heroes they found interesting as the first MY HERO stories to read together as a class.

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Created by: Jerrilyn Jacobs, Curriculum Consultant