0. Info startweek
1. Jij begint
1.1 Why would you choose this quest?
At HVX we are constantly training our abillity to research, be curious, getting to know ourselves better and find out what it is that you find interesting! During this quest you get to train and use all of these things.
By studying your own chosen topic/subject in English, you will improve both your knowledge about this topic that you find interesting and also improve your English language skills.
This quest consists of two parts:
- You choose a subject that you find interesting and want to learn more about.
- Together with an English coach you decide which English skill you are going to focus on.
It will depend on yóu how many XMs you will earn. Depending on how many work you put into it.
But it is much easier to work when you find something interesting! This is why we have created this quest for you, so that you can improve your English skills while learning about something that you already love or what you are curious about.
You will need your own perseverance, but we will also help you through this process.
Read on quickly to take the first steps!
1.2 Motivation motor
Motivation motor
➜ Start a new quest in Egodact. Describe why you want to start this quest and also why you want to finish it. This quest requires of you that you carefully fill out all of the steps in Egodact.
1.3 Choose a topic!
Before you can start this quest, you need to choose a topic/subject that you are going to learn about!
Sometimes freedom to choose can be quite difficult. There are so many options that you have no idea where to start.
This is why we share a couple of ways to trigger your creative brain and curiousity. If you already have an idea about what you want to learn, you can go straight on to the next step. If you don't have an idea you will pick one of the following exercises and do them. Make sure to upload the task in Seesaw/Egodact.
1. Make a list of all the things that you are curious about.
You can set aside 20 minutes to do this and you are not allowed to stop writing during these 20 minutes.
Or you can walk around with this for 3 days, write down everything (on your phone for example) that you are curious about.
2. Make a mindmap of everything about your life.
Examples: Hobbies, Sports, Food, Holidays, Pets, Your family (and their jobs and hobbies), Friends, What do you watch most on TikTok/YouTube, other interests
3. Play an association game with a friend/classmate/coach.
Before you start you need to decide how many words you are going to write down (it needs to be more than 10, but less then 35). Get a piece of paper and a pen. One of you starts by writing down (and saying it out loud) a random word. For example: pizza. The other one writes down the first word that comes to mind when hearing the word pizza, for example: brick oven. Then the other one writes down the first word that comes to mind when hearing the word brick oven etc. You will continue until you have written down the amount of words that you decided on before starting.
After this you have so many different words, maybe one of them sparks your curiosity.
4. Use this website to generate random pictures:
https://www.generatormix.com/random-image-generator
Generate at least 20 pictures, copy the ones to a pages document that spark your curiosity.
Maybe after doing one of these tasks you already have a pretty good idea of what you want to research. If you don't have any ideas, some other students have come up with the following ideas:
Biology → Research certain internal human body parts
Art → What different art styles exist?
Technology → How does a computer work?
Language → Difference between English and Dutch proverbs.
Sports → Make your own football.
Self development → How to do a presentation?
How can you concentrate better?
Why do we procrastinate?
Culture and history -> What is the Irish revolution?
What were the events that led up to world war II?
What are the origin stories of different holidays?
Science -> How do insulated bottles work?
How does a plane stay in the air?
How did they invent lego?
1.4 Create a plan!
If you have chosen a topic, find Mr Esmeijer or Ms. de Jonge in a BloX! The coaches will approve or decline your chosen topic/subject before you can start. We are going to help you to define a research question and which English skill you are going to focus on.
A good research question can be tough to set up. What often happens is that you have thought of a question that you can easily google, and the answer will be there.
When you have a research question, ask the following questions:
- Does the question fit in with you chosen subject?
- Can you find the answer with a simple Google search?
- Can you learn something from it (or do you already know the answer)?
- Is the question clear?
- Is it possible to answer the question?
Upload the following to Egodact/Seesaw:
- Your chosen topic
- Feedback from one of the English coaches
- Your chosen English skill to focus on
- What your end product will be
- The answers to the control questions above
2. Let's do it!
2.1 Research
Now it is time to carry out your plan! It is very important to document every step of the way. This is why you will keep a source reference list and make short notes on everything that you research.
There are different ways to keep track of the sources that you use. You can either decide if you are going to use a source reference system (such as APA or Harvard etc.), if you'd like to learn this and prepare yourself for college/university, then you will include this in your research. Or you can set up a pages document and make sure to copy every link to every site that you use to get information. Resources also include books, videos, people that give you information, magazines, newspapers etc.
2.2 Process
The process looks different for every student who does this quest. If your own process is not clear for you after making the plan with one of the coaches, come and see us.
2.3 End result
Your end result will consist of the following:
- All of the documents that have been talked about before uploaded to Seesaw/Egodact
- A source reference list
- A summary of the sources that you have used
- A logbook of every time that you have worked on this quest with details of what you did.
- The end product will be different for every student. If you chose to focus on the skill 'speaking', it could be that you make a presentation or a vlog. If you chose to focus on the skill 'writing', it could be a written story etc.
3. Reflection
To finish this quest you are going to reflect in two ways:
- You will make a review about your process, by recommending this quest to other students.
You will either create a written review, a vlog, a voice memo etc. (in English) where you describe your process during this quest (what have you done, how did you do this, what did you learn and why did you like it or why didn't you etc.).
- You will reflect on your chosen English skill. Did your improve your chosen English skill and how do you know this? How did you do this? Are you satisfied with how much progress you have made through this quest or should it have been different?
Feedback: as coaches we always appreciate feedback as well. What would you change in this quest to make it even more better/fun? What was good about it already?
