WiseNews database for upper primary students and teachers

Abstract

Electronic databases are widely used by students and teachers at secondary and tertiary level to gather information for academic purposes. Few studies have investigated their use in primary education, especially in the Asian context. A pilot study conducted a year ago has shown that WiseNews, an electronic news database, was effective in facilitating the inquiry project-based learning of primary students at a school in Hong Kong. The current research extends the pilot study by examining the use of WiseNews by upper primary students and their teachers in five local primary schools. Automatic records of students’ and teachers’ database activities provided by WiseNews will be used to examine the usage habit of students and teachers. Students and teachers will be surveyed regarding their perceived usefulness of WiseNews database for learning and teaching purposes. Data collection and analysis adopted a mixed method design. The qualitative analysis will include an in-depth analysis of the types of articles retrieved by the students, in addition to the responses to the open-ended questions on the survey. This research will help teachers and school administrators to assess the effectiveness of WiseNews database in facilitating learning at upper primary levels.