Designing Web-Based Training: How to Teach Anyone Anything Anywhere Anytime

6.6. Scavenger hunt

Scavenger hunts challenge learners to find their own sources of information on the network. In a scavenger hunt, learners gather scattered bits of knowledge from various Internet and intranet sources. To prove that they have found the sought-for item, they provide:

• The requested fact or knowledge

• A citation of it in a standard work

• The URL were it can be found

6.6.1. When to use a scavenger hunt

Use a scavenger hunt to teach learners to find their own sources of reliable information on the Internet or an intranet. This is especially valuable in fields where the best, most up-to-date, most accurate information is found only online. In such fields, knowing where to find information is an essential job skill in its own right.

Use scavenger hunts to teach learners to:

• Find information on the Internet or intranet

• Navigate a large reference document, such as a specification or technical manual

• Retrieve information from a database

Scavenger hunts teach learners to find, evaluate, and select sources of information. In addition to learning how to find sources, as a bonus, learners acquire sources they can rely on in the future.

6.6.2. How a scavenger hunt works

6.6.3. Example of a scavenger hunt

Learning a rapidly advancing body of knowledge requires learning how to keep current with changes in the field. For instance, programmers must have access to the latest information ...