How Rylan Created his Treehouse Investigation
Step 4 References and Information on the Internet
See the sections below to learn how Rylan planned for and composed Step #4 of his treehouse investigation, Weeds in Rylan's Yard.
- Planning / Following the basic treehouse guidelines
- Editing with the Treehouse Editor
- Links to other helpful pages
- Try it yourself!
Planning / Following the Basic Treehouse Guidelines
How Rylan Gathered References
Rylan used the University of Arizona's online catalog to find books about weeds that he then checked out and studied. Any public library would also work fine.
Basic Tree house Guidelines: References (Book /Magazines etc.)
At least three book, journal, magazine, documentary film etc. type references, formatted in a bibliography style.
How Rylan Gathered Information on the Internet
Because there is so much information available on the Internet, Rylan wanted to make sure the sites he linked to on his page provided quality information. For example, Rylan wanted sites that were regularly updated and preferred sites that were not commercial. Rylan found good sites by surfing the Internet and surveying sites that matched the topics he was interested in. Rylan followed the basic (optional) treehouse guidelines and listed three good quality Internet links.
Basic Tree house Guidelines: Information on the Internet
At least three quality links with information on what one will find at each site. Links must have something to do with treehouse page content. These Internet links must be entered in the Information on the Internet Section, but if students would like they may also put hyperlinks in other sections of their page.
How Rylan Gathered "People References"
Rylan has two "people references."
- His roommate was picking weeds the day Rylan decided to have weeds as his treehouse theme. She and Rylan talked about the fact that she did not want weeds in their yard.
- Rylan also found landscaping companies in the phone book advertising weed control services, so Rylan called one of them to talk about how frequently the company had requests to get rid of weeds in people’s yards.
Basic Tree house Guidelines: "People References"
- Student discusses topic with others and gains their opinion or expertise.
- The person spoken with does not need to be an expert.
- Students can do things such as create survey questions to ask people in their neighborhood.
Editing with the Treehouse Editor
Adding References
Once Rylan had three interesting references he went to the Reference section and typed them in, just as he would if he were writing a bibliography for a report.
Adding "People" References
Rylan discussed his conversation with his roommate and the landscaping company in his treehouse text. To do this he went to Step 2 Edit Page Content and chose to compose text. He then created a section called "What Other People Think." In this section he wrote about what he learned from his two "people" references.
Adding Internet Links
Rylan went to the Information on the Internet section and entered:
- the URL and the name for each web site in the Page URL field
- the name of the site in the Name of Site/Page field
- information about what someone could learn at each site in the comments field
To get spaces for more internet links he choose how many more links he wanted to add, put that number in the space and clicked submit.
Additional Links
Try it Yourself!
To use the treehouse editor you may either:
- Log-in as a treehouse builder
- Or, if you are not yet registered as a treehouse builder you can try out the treehouse building tools. However, note that nothing that you create while trying out the tools will be saved to the ToL database.
Once you are at the Treehouse Editor, choose Step 4 Edit References and Information on the Internet. Try filling out the fields. Click on Save and Preview to see the information that you have entered in the Information on the Internet and References sections of the treehouse page.