Washington D.C.
A WebQuest for 3rd Grade Social Studies Unit

Designed by Stephanie Rofinot

rofnots@pacificu.edu

Introduction

The student will be designing a tour of Washington D.C. When they are completed with this webquest, they will have a better understanding of the historical sites located in our nation's capitol. Their task in this WebQuest is to design a tour of Washington D.C. Students will be assigned to a partner. They will be leading a group of tourist around town who has never been to Washington D.C.  It is their job to give them a tour of the city showing them places that would be interesting to visit.   Students will be given a list of "places of interest", of each place and it's web site. 

Learners

This lesson is designed for third graders. It can be modified and changed to fit the needs of any class though. It is a socal studies lesson on Washington D.C.

They will need some background information on Washington D.C. I would suggest using this webquest at the end of a unit.

Curriculum Standards

Social Studies Benchmarks Addressed

• U.S. History: Understand and interpret events, issues, and developments within and across eras of U.S. History.

Process

READ ALL THE DIRECTIONS BEFORE YOU CLICK!  Here is how you are going to prepare your tour:

1.  Choose a partner.  Be sure this is someone you can work well with and get the assignment completed in the time allotted. 

2.  Check out these websites.  Make sure you read them thoroughly and click on any links that may contain information valuable for your research.  View all of the websites before making your final decision.  The websites are as follows:

3.  Take notes on the websites you visited.  Some of the key facts you should have are:
    Why is this place important?  What is interesting to know about this location?  What makes it special and worth visiting? 

4.  You and your partner will write out an itinerary of your tour.  The itinerary needs to be typed after you have written a rough draft.  The rough draft should be edited by your partner, and turned in with the final draft.  Make sure you include:

• Where will you go first?  Why?  (What is most important about this location?)  Approximate time.  What time will you get there?  How long will you be there?
  
• Where will you go second?  Why?  (What is most important about this location?)  Approximate time.  What time will you get there?  How long will you be there?
• Where will you go third?  Why?  (What is most important about this location?)  Approximate time.  What time will you get there?  How long will you be there?
• Where will you go fourth?  Why?  (What is most important about this location?)  Approximate time.  What time will you get there?  How long will you be there?

Resources Needed

You as a teacher will need:

• Computers with internet access.
• A guide on how to get to/use some kind of word document
• Background knowledge of the websites to assist students if they get stuck, or to help them find more important facts and information.

Evaluation

You will know this lesson was successful by the itinerary report that the students turn in. It should include a timeline and the facts and information the students found about the historical site they visited. The evaluation rubric is on the student page, use that as a guideline for scoring their work.

Credits & References

The image used in this WebQuest was obtained from:

www.vaniasphotos.tripod.com

You might want to include the following statement:

"We all benefit by being generous with our work. Permission is hereby granted for other educators to copy this WebQuest, update or otherwise modify it, and post it elsewhere provided that the original author's name is retained along with a link back to the original URL of this WebQuest. On the line after the original author's name, you may add Modified by (your name) on (date). If you do modify it, please let me know and provide the new URL."