Charles Lindbergh

Designed by:
Dan Bauder
Rod Godinez
Stefan Harroo
Polly Sileo
Jennifer Slye

Introduction | Content Areas | Standards | Implementation | Resources | Entry Skills | Evaluation | Variations | Conclusion

Introduction

This webquest was developed as part of a project at the University of Maryland, College Park in a Computers for Teachersclass.

This lesson revolves around Charles Lindbergh.  It contains an in depth look at his famous flight over the Atlantic Ocean.  This lesson was designed to be a part of a U.S. History unit on the 1920's.  The activity will include cooperative learning groups investigating topics in categories such as:  Facts about The Spirit of Saint Louis, Charles Lindbergh's life, About the Flight, and Problems Before, During, and After the Flight.  The students will find this information using the web sites found on this Web Quest.
 

Content Area and Grade Level

This lesson is designed to be part of a sixth grade social studies unit.  It could be contained in a U.S. History unit looking at the early 20th century or the history of flight.
 

Objectives

The students will learn the importance of Charles Lindbergh's flight and its impact on history.

The students will be expected to know detailed information about the flight as a result of their own research and information presented during the oral presentations.  The students should understand the history and struggle leading up to modern day aviation, realizing that flight did not used to be as simple as it is today.  The students will learn to investigate topics of interest through searches done on the Internet.

They are learning interpersonal communication and teamwork skills in their cooperative learning groups.  They are learning how to process and filter information in order to present only the information pertinent to their content category.
 

Implementation Overview

This interdisciplinary lesson involves both Social Studies and Language Arts.  The students will be studying the history of Lindbergh and his airplane, the Spirit of Saint Louis in cooperative learning groups and collecting information from the Internet.  Each group will be assigned a content category, each covering a different aspect of Lindbergh.  They will also be required to write a short summary on their "facts" category they investigated, which they will present to the class.

The lesson will require five class periods of forty minutes each and one additional full day.  The first two class periods will be used to introduce the lesson and students will search the web and take notes.  The third and fourth periods will be used to develop the summary and organize the oral presentation.  For the fifth period students will give their presentations to the class.  During the additional day, the students will take a field trip to the Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C to conclude this unit.

Resources Needed

Resources needed are:

• Think Sheet
• Computers - 4
• Netscape or Internet Explorer - 4 copies
• Word Processing Program (i.e. Word, or Word Perfect) - 4 copies

Aviation Relived: http://www.ccnet.com/~peggysue/lindbergh.html

 Micro Wings:  http://www.microwings.com/mw_lindy.html

 The Knowledge Adventure Encyclopedia:  http://www.letsfindout.com/

 ALLSTAR Network:  http://www.allstar.fiu.edu/aerojava/lindbergh2.htm

 The Charles Lindbergh Story:  http://tommy.jssc.nasa.gov/~woodfill/SPACEED/SEHHTML/Lind7.html
 

Only one teacher is necessary for the class periods.  However, the field trip would require aides or parent volunteers to chaperone the students.

Entry Level Skills and Knowledge

The students will need to know what Charles Lindbergh accomplished and that his flight is important.  They will also need to know that this event took place in the 1920's, which is why the class is studying him.  They will need to know how to manipulate the computer and further, the Internet.  They should also know how to condense information into a summary.

A teacher who is doing this lesson would need to have basic knowledge of Charles Lindbergh, which can be found above on the websites we have provided.  The teacher should also have knowledge of how to manipulate the computer and the Internet, if problems should arise and to be able to guide students in their research process.  A novice teacher could accomplish teaching this lesson because it is essentially allowing the students to learn who Charles Lindbergh was through their own research.  The teacher will basically have to maintain orderly classroom behavior as groups are conducting their research.

Evaluation

This lesson will be deemed successful when the students have produced a comprehensive summary of their topic area during their oral presentations.  Their success will be based on the quality of the content as well as the quality of the presentation incorporating both Social Studies and Language Arts standards.  This lesson will also be successful if the students have manipulated the Internet in order to obtain the needed information. The presentation will be evaluated using a letter grade scale based on a scoring key the teacher designs for this lesson.

Possible Variations

The students can look for websites on the Internet on their own and not use starting point sites that are provided.  This lesson could also be altered by using the same process to research other historic figures and events.

Conclusion

This lesson puts the responsibility of learning into the students' hands.  History books often focus on the large events through the decades, such as wars.  The smaller events are overshadowed and under-appreciated even though they might be more relevant to students' interests and everyday lives.  This lesson will teach the students to value the importance of flight and its impact on history.