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English and ICT
Using the Web
Reading the web
Activity summary – Reading the web
- Ask student teachers to closely monitor and analyse their own use of the Internet.
- Reflect as a group on the differences between reading printed and web-based texts.
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Most (although not all) student teachers will have plenty of experience in using the Internet but much of that knowledge may be tacit. In raising their awareness of the nature of reading on the web, we begin by asking them to reflect on how they access information. (Sometimes, we place them in pairs, asking one to act as an observer who notes down what their partner does. This can be useful as the feedback often generates discussion about different strategies and common problems.) We use the following framework to structure this activity:
- Use the Internet to search for some information on a subject that interests you or to find out something you really need to know, e.g. a train time. (The choice of topic is up to you.) As you search, make a note of exactly how you do so.
- Now reflect on how finding information using the Internet (reading the web) is different from finding information using printed texts.
Consider:
- How you found the website in the first place (and how this compares to locating a printed text)?
- Ease of moving between texts written by different authors (and the impact of this on the way you read webpages compared to the way you read printed texts).
- Navigational features within webpages/printed texts (e.g. contents page in book, menu on website) - what are they and how do you use them?
- How you make sense of the different texts – what is the role of images, words, moving images and sound?
- Consider:
- All the occasions on which you have used the Internet recently.
- For what kinds of reasons do you use the Internet?
- Does the way in which you access the Internet vary according to your purpose for using it?
- Now write a paragraph on the similarities and differences between reading the web and reading print-based texts. Comment on both the purposes for which you read the different texts and the strategies and skills you draw on.
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Some of the points we aim to explore through reflection on this activity are listed here.
 
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