No school because of a winter hurrican? No problem...let's Wiki!

 

No school because of a winter hurricane? No problem...let's Wiki!

I must admit that I was not very familiar with wikis prior to this semester in ITIS. I was even a bit skeptical when we received the ITSOPedia assignment to due in lui of Winter Storm Pax hitting the Northern Virginia area causing class to be cancelled. After using the tool quite a bit and learning the affordances of it though I must share that I am quite fond of this tool now. When the storm hit and we were assigned to post on the wiki I was ecstatic.


I enjoy that everyone can see who has posted, edited, and added what and at what time so that there is never any group animosity for "slacker" group members. When one can visually see what others are posting and when I think it strengthens group cohesiveness. I also enjoy how one can post files, work on various pages, and create a collaborative site and feel like a knowledgeable contributor. I've been able to use this tool with my advocacy group with much ease and do prefer it to Blackboard because you don't have to have several threads open at once to access what you want to see and work on in the wiki.

Using wiki's in the classroom is an area I am still brainstorming on. Will Richardson shares with us that: "A wiki is a type of website that allows users to easily add and edit content and is especially suited for collaborative writing. That means that on typical wikis, anyone can edit anything at anytime. Fun! Because of how open most wikis are, many educators find them a bit tough to deal with."

But how can I get students suited for collaborative writing. We are currently doing a unit on editing our work in English class and I thought, if it were adapted enough, students might be able to go on a wiki site and edit works that needed fixing or that did not have correct information. It could help students strengthen their editing skills but also covertly show them the uses and purpose of wiki's. If anything we do know the usefulness and effectiveness of this collaborative tool as it enabled our cohort to have a very engaged and productive class period even with 16+ inches of snow!