As Middle School Spanish II students, you have studied a number of Spanish speaking countries: Mexico, Puerto Rico, Ecuador, La Madre Patria, Spain, and the United States, a country with one of highest Spanish speaking population. Throughout the study of these countries you have become aware of their culture and language. Therefore, you are familiar with their art and architecture, daily life, climate and seasons, food, geography, history, and more. Now, your school’s World Language Department has assigned your group to study another Spanish speaking country, the Dominican Republic. The results of your investigation will be presented to the Spanish students of all Middle Schools in the district at a general assembly. This assembly will be held in the High School auditorium on the last day of school. Now that you know what your quest will be about and the people to whom it will be presented, piensa! What will your investigation lead you to? Will your experience be different this time than when you studied a country in the textbook? How different is the culture of this Caribbean island from the culture of the other countries you have studied? So, put on your Caribbean spirit hat and go on. Buena suerte!
Standards for Foreign Language Learning
Communications
Communicate in Languages Other Than English
Standard 1.1: Students engage in conversations, provide and obtain information, express feelings and emotions, and exchange opinions
Standard 1.2: Students understand and interpret written and spoken language on a variety of topics
Standard 1.3: Students present information, concepts, and ideas to an audience of listeners or readers on a variety of topics.
Cultures
Gain Knowledge and Understanding of Other Cultures
Standard 2.1: Students demonstrate an understanding of the relationship between the practices and perspectives of the culture studied
Standard 2.2: Students demonstrate an understanding of the relationship between the products and perspectives of the culture studied.
Connections
Connect with Other Disciplines and Acquire Information
Standard 3.1: Students reinforce and further their knowledge of other disciplines through the foreign language
Standard 3.2: Students acquire information and recognize the distinctive viewpoints that are only available through the foreign language and its cultures
Comparisons
Develop Insight into the Nature of Language and Culture
Standard 4.1: Students demonstrate understanding of the nature of language through comparisons of the language studied and their own
Standard 4.2: Students demonstrate understanding of the concept of culture through comparisons of the cultures studied and their own.
Communities
Participate in Multilingual Communities at Home & Around the World
Standard 5.1: Students use the language both within and beyond the school setting
Standard 5.2: Students show evidence of becoming life-long learners by using the language for personal enjoyment and enrichment.
In order for your group to accomplish the study on the Dominican Republic successfully, you will divide your study into the following areas:
Geography and Maps, Language, Money and population, History, Music, Arts, Historical places, Food, Handicrafts, Greetings and Farewells, Clothing and climate, Sports, Government, School Life, Travel and Transportation, Pastimes and Leisure Activities, and Tourism.
Since your group is composed of four students, you will divide these areas evenly, four areas per students, and all four members of the group will investigate about the tourism. This is because the Dominican Republic is rich in tourist sites, especially resorts.
Once you collect all of the information about the above mentioned areas, you will then present them in a PowerPoint presentation. You would need to illustrate each slide of the presentation with pictures that you will find on the websites provided, or any other source that your group considers provides a good representation of the topics studied. As you work along to prepare the presentation, see how all of the areas you have investigated are interconnected. For instance, how the climate and food are related; pastimes and climate; geography and food, and so on. You are to include these interrelations as you develop your PowerPoint presentation.
Because the areas of the Dominican Republic’s culture to be investigated and studied are interconnected, the members of the group should work in collaboration and cooperation so you help each other when those aspects of one member’s investigation becomes part of the other member’s study. This way you will make the interconnection as you study the culture, making it easier when putting it together for the PowerPoint presentation.
During your study of the Spanish speaking countries that were presented in your textbook, you read specific information about those countries and the material was already synthesized to what was meaningful to a student to know about those countries. Therefore, along your investigation you will find a broad amount of information that you will need to synthesized as to what you consider it is important to the people to whom your presentation will be presented. Keep in mind that most of them as well have not study the Dominican Republic, so you will need to make your findings appealing to their interest. Will the students want to have this country’s culture included in their course of study next year? Will the World Language Department of your school include the study of this country in the curriculum for the following years? All of this will depend on how well prepared is your study of this country’s culture.
Based on the information that I have presented and explained in the Task section, you will now begin your investigation and study of the Dominican Republic using the links to internet sites listed below. You should be able to find in these sites all of the information needed to complete your Quest. And remember to expand your horizons, so if you come across any information that you consider appealing and pertinent to include in your presentation, feel free to do so.
Once you have compelled all of the information for the individual areas of study, you will need to discuss your findings. Keep in mind that all of the aspects of a culture in one way or another are interrelated. Then you may decide, as a group, the amount of information and the number of pictures that you will include in your presentation.
Along the development of your study, keep in mind the final purpose of your investigation and the audience to whom it will be presented. Think of how you as students would have liked to be introduced to any country’s culture. Make it appealing, interesting, informative, and colorful, so the students are excited to learn about this country and the World Language Department staff finds it educational and useful, so they include your study in future curriculum planning.
And one last suggestion: consider adding Dominican music to your PowerPoint. Music is a very important part of their culture and it will make your presentation fun and entertaining. Just look in the music internet link, or search the internet for Dominican music and download it to your computer.
You will present your findings about the Dominican Republic in a PowerPoint presentation. Your work will be assessed based on the following rubric, and it will be evaluated as a group. Therefore, it is important that each member of the group works diligently to comply with the project requirements.
Rubric
Task completion
1 Minimal completion of the task/or content frequently inappropriate.
Comprehensibility
1 Text barely comprehensible.
Vocabulary
1 Inadequate and/or inaccurate use of vocabulary.
Language Control
1 Inadequate and/or inaccurate use of basic language structures.
Mechanics
1 Inaccurate spelling, use of diacritical marks, punctuation, and/or capitalization.
I am sure that this investigation about the Dominican Republic was fun and entertaining, as well as educational and informative. Now you have a better understanding of this Spanish speaking country’s culture, people, and way of life. Now, think back to the time when you began this project, and reflect on how this study has provided you with the necessary knowledge to be able to present your findings to the students, and to influence the decisions of the World Language Department staff to include this country in future lessons for the Spanish classes.
As you move forward as Spanish students, think about how beneficial it would be for all of the Spanish students if in addition to the material presented in the textbook, the students are given the opportunity to have an active participation in the process of learning the Spanish language, by allowing them to explore a different Spanish speaking country at least once during the school year. Will the students be more enthusiastic and motivated to study and to continue to study the Spanish language? And how will these additions to the curriculum will affect the future enrollment in the Spanish classes? Will such enrollment decrease or increase? You decide...
And last but not least, please list five questions that have occurred to you during the course of your study, and present these questions to your audience at the end of the presentation. Ask the audience to try to answer them for you. This will add to your presentation, making it interactive and interesting. I hope that this Web Quest project has been beneficial to you in many ways, and remember that "Spanish Rules"!!! See you at the presentation on the last day of school!!!
Quest Links
Music
2 Partial completion of the task; content mostly appropriate; ideas undeveloped.
3 Completion of the task; content appropriate; ideas adequately developed.
4 Superior completion of the task; content appropriate; ideas well developed and well
organized.
2 Text mostly comprehensible, requiring interpretation on the part of the reader.
3 Text comprehensible, requiring minimal interpretation on the part of the reader.
4 Text readily comprehensible, requiring no interpretation on the part of the reader.
2 Somewhat inadequate and/or inaccurate use of vocabulary.
3 Adequate and accurate use of vocabulary.
4. Rich use of vocabulary.
2 Emerging use of basic language structures.
3 Emerging control of basic language structures.
4 Control of basic language structures.
2 Somewhat inaccurate spelling, use of diacritical marks, punctuation, and/or capitalization.
3 Mostly accurate spelling, use of diacritical marks, punctuation, and /or capitalization.
4 Few or no errors in spelling, use of diacritical marks, punctuation, and/or capitalization.
Wikipedia
Geography and more
Arts, culture, sports, food, and more
Money, weather.......
Visiting Dominican Republic
Dominican Republic
Quick reference to Spanish Speaking Countries
Tourism
More Tourism
