Web Quest: Research the Journey

For Grade 5 By

Dana Dawson

Introduction (Top)

There are so many important aspects to the journey of the pioneers as they traveled the Oregon Trail.  What supplies did they take?  What were the wagons like?  Were Indians as big a threat as the western movies might lead us to believe?  Who were the early explorers of the Oregon Trail?  What were the hardships faced by the pioneers?  What is cholera? Through what cities did the trail actually go through? 

 In this Web Quest, the student will answer some of these questions.

Tasks (Top)

Choose one aspect of the Oregon Trail adventure, research it and present you findings to the class in a PowerPoint presentation.

Resources (Top)  

Research Cycle Guide.  Use this guide to direct you through the research project.
PowerPoint Presentation Outline.  Use this template to plan you PowerPoint presentation.
Example of Student Presentation

Internet Sites:

General Information
End of the Oregon Trail Historic Library
Oregon Trail Time Frames A Year-by-Year Description of Explorers, Travelers, and Events Along the Trail to Oregon
Links to other Oregon Trail and American West Resources
The Oregon Trail Website This is a complete web site about the Oregon Trail. 
Key Dates of the Oregon Trail Timeline of events on the Oregon Trail.  
The Oregon Trail The American West site--informative text and images
Historic Sites Along the Oregon Trail: a good description of stops from St. Louis to Oregon City.
National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center The BLM web site
Oregon-California Trail Association a good website for general information
Are We There Yet? Traveling the trail--then and now, a very nice web site published by students at the Robert Gray Middle School, Portland Oregon
"End of the Oregon Trail" Interpretive Center in Oregon City, Oregon. Uses living history interpretations and exhibits that immerse visitors in the dreams, desires and adventures of those who made the journey west. This facility was constructed in the shape of three covered wagons.
And a great new map feature: Click able Oregon Trail in Oregon
The great debate on whether to power your covered wagon with Horse, Mule or Oxen

Other information

Wagon Trains And more...this site also includes information about routes, day-to-day activities along the trail, food and clothing
Jumping Off! Preparing for the adventure of a lifetime 
Fish and Wildlife On the Oregon Trail Then and Now
The Historical Gazette Published in Portland, Oregon: "Linking the Past with the Future" with historic headlines and trail stories.  

Personalities of the Trail:

Discoverers and Explorers: Who really found the Oregon Trail?

John Sutter The man who saw his immense wealth and power overrun in the world's rush to pick California clean of gold 
Emily Towell Emigrated in 1881 from Missouri to Oregon 
Reuben and Hannah Coyle Traveled to Oregon in 1847 with a $10 gold coin--to be used only in the event of utter poverty and desperation. It's now with the Oregon Historical Society. 
Biographical Sketches of Black Pioneers and Settlers of the Pacific Northwest
William Henry Parker: The Trek West " A winner of the 1996 DAR essay competition. Written by his g-g-g-g-granddaughter, Cameron S. Boisvert. 
The Donner Party from the Truckee-Donner Historical Society 
People in the West: Marcus and Narcissa Whitman From the PBS web site.

Diaries

Pioneer Diaries and Emigrant Biographies from the End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center Across the Plains in '64 by Prairie Schooner to Oregon transcribed by Anna Dell Clinkinbeard. The story of her g-g-grandfather's family crossing the plains in a covered wagon in 1864 Across the Rockies to the Columbia An account of a young ornithologist, John Kirk Townsend, published in

1838, who journeyed overland on what was to become the Oregon Trail, to the trapper's Rendezvous on Ham's Fork of the Green River; continuing west, his party established Fort Hall, near what is now Pocatello, ID. Thence onward to Fort Vancouver, on the Columbia.

Other sources:

Oregon Trail (Tales of the Wild West Series)
by Rick Steber, Don Gray (Illustrator)

Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia 99
Other encyclopedias, atlases

Process (Top)

Task 1: The Research Cycle Guide will help guide you through your research.  Here are the steps you should go through while completing this project. 

Questioning-Write questions you would like answered about the Oregon Trail adventure.  Choose the question you would like to research.

Planning- Begin looking for sources of information to answer your question. You can use any of the sources listed above.  Select sources that provide the best and most reliable information for their chosen topic.  

Gathering Information- Start gathering information about your topic.  You can save your information in a word processor or on index cards.  Be sure to note where the information came from. 

Sorting-You can now concentrate on scanning your gathered information, to provide the answers to the question you decided to research.   You should choose the information that most contributes to the understanding of the audience.  

Synthesizing-This step brings all the pieces together, where you arrange the information into the power point template.  The goal of this step is to allow you to see that the gathered information, when organized properly, will answer your question. 

Evaluating-This is an ongoing process through all the steps and you need to constantly evaluate to see if the puzzle is missing any pieces. You may need to ask where more information is needed, which then can kick off the cycle again and provide a better, more complete answer.

Task 2:        Prepare a presentation of your research, using Microsoft’s PowerPoint application.  

Task 3:        Present you presentation to the class.   

Evaluation (Top)

The Rubric for Multimedia Presentation will be used for evaluation of this project.

 Conclusion (Top)

The Oregon Trail experience is diverse and varied.  It is important that the student be able to explore self-directed aspects of the journey.  By viewing research projects of other students, the student will gain knowledge about the whole experience.