Conclusions:
1) The time I spent creating the webquest was well worth it.  My students seemed to be much more "into" learning the content area to create their slide shows.  I also feel they learned more than they would have from texts alone. As you are aware, there is an incredible amount of information on the Internet.  There is no way all of the endangered animal information would fit into one text or be accessed so quickly.  Realistically, I probably won't have time to create a lot of webquests, or to find computer lab time to work on them with my classes.  However, I really liked using the Internet this way for teaching content.  It would be worth it to create another webquest second semester.  I would like to try one of the other subject areas I teach.  I will be teaching about Ancient Greece, Rome, and the Middle Ages this spring in social studies.  Any of these topics would make a really fun/educational webquest topic.  Maybe I'll actually work on one over Christmas break!
2)  I do feel students learned more by going on a webquest than  traditional teaching methods. Students were able to pick the animals they wanted to research, which made it much more motivating to them.  Many students chose animals they had never heard of or seen before.  They not only found text information, but photographs as well.  The students were then able to learn even more by viewing each others slide shows.  Of course they were very interested in what their peers had created and paid a great deal of attention when viewing them.
3)  It is amazing how simple it was to explain the webquest to my students.  I discussed it with them for about 5-10 minutes in class, then we went to the computers. I showed them the site first by projecting it on a screen while they sat on the floor and watched. Once the students got to their computers, most of them figured out how to procede on their own.  I circulated throughout the lab answering questions here and there, but there were not that many of them.  I was not run ragged going from computer to computer as I initially imagined.  I explained Power Point by projecting the program on a screen so students could see what I did and follow along step by step.  I won't say it was perfect, but they really caught on quite well.  I had one other adult circulating through my group of twenty-five.
4)  I discovered I had quite a computer literate group this year.  About 90% of students had computers at home.  Those without computers were a bit slower completing the project.   There were many volunteers to help the few students that were confused.  Teaching Poewer Point was a lot of fun.  The students love the program, but, of course, loved the animation effects most of all.  Maybe I won't even point them out next year!  I feel I could do this project even without such a good group.  You should try a Webquest!  In my opinion, sixth graders can handle the technology.  If you have a very technologically illiterate group you will have to do more explaining about the Internet, links to sites, etc., but I don't feel this would be a big problem.
5)  The quality of my students' work was mixed (as usual).  Some students were much more focused and on task than others.  I do feel students learned more.  This is because they were all focused on the Internet information.  This is not always true with texts or other books.   It was slide show creation that caused a problem with some.  Either they were so into the Internet they hardly got started, or they were so interested in graphics and animation there wasn't much information written down.  Most students did a very good job considering they had never done a WebQuest and I did not give them as much time as I wanted to in the computer lab.
6)  Did my students like doing the WebQuest and slide shows?  YES!  The majority of the students said they would have preferred this kind of experience to what I did last year (I explained what I had done and showed them samples of last year's work).  There were some students who indicated that they really love drawing and felt they missed out by not doing an endagered animal poster.  Some students thought I should assign both or make the poster extra credit.  Almost all my students indicated that they would not have learned near as much if they had not been using the Internet.  Many students learned about animals they had never even heard of before.