"Reading" has assumed a new face, given the authentic resources available on the WorldWideWeb.  The difficulty for teachers is how to integrate this kind of reading into the normal curriculum, especially given the danger involved when students get into the web for specific purposes.

     Many teachers already use e-mail to encourage students to write in a foreign language.  However, the web can also be integrated into reading curricula, to offer students a different kind of authentic cultural environment than an ordinary book.  The web reflects the organizational and social habits of a large group of people, and it is designed to serve users; it is therefore its own kind of cultural community.  In consequence, it can be used to teach students higher levels of the skills represented in the Standards, as an electronic data base to accompany e-mail and other electronic conferencing tasks, as well as for more conventional class discussions and writing.

     The sections which follow each suggest how exercises using the WorldWideWeb (and, occasionally, e-mail or discussion formats) can grow out of the kinds of exercise sequences outlined in the previous four units of Part Two of the Going the Distance: Reading website.  Like the preceding units, these exercises are designed with reference to Draußen vor der Tür, and will require at least the first three phases of language practice (pre-reading, initial reading, and reading for knowledge), if students are to be prepared optimally to engage in them; Phase 4 and Phase 5 will be crucial, if the students are not only to complete the search exercises with the web, but also to discuss or write about their results in German.  Each section is also keyed to one of the sets of Standards, and is intended mainly as a prompt to the kinds of exercises that teachers will need to integrate into the curriculum at all levels: the web is rapidly becoming the chief location for storage and retrieval of information, and so students will increasingly need to be familiar with its potential and with how to use it effectively.  One caveat: because of the information density of the web, it is unlikely that students who are not cognitively mature will be able to use it effectively, even with effective preparation -- younger students will have no trouble using the web or e-mail, and there will be much incidental learning resulting because of the time spent on web tasks, but they will not necessarily be able to profit from it systematically.

     After you read each exercise, you will have the option of responding to a question in a Brainstorming Session, or proceeding directly to Hints which help explain the design of each exercise.

     Also, you have the option of clicking on an information page of useful web browsers for Germany, either before or after you work through the sample essays.  This page is not intended to be exhaustive, but to give you necessary resources to design student search exercises using the WorldWideWeb or other electronic formats.