"11 Tools" Post #6 WIKIS

I like the idea of students using their wiki to increase their participation in language arts assignment especially in the area of editing and revision. I can see them reinforcing vocabulary as they continuously reenter their story to reread and add as a group. I find that students have issues with elaboration and fluency because they think they are done writing when they have finished the first draft. It is difficult to convince them that a piece of writing is never done; it can always be revised and made better. They want to move on to the next thing, whatever that might be. Sharing and editing each others work, will allow them to pull on higher level skills of synthesizing and evaluating their own work, the work of others, and their group work.

As an aside, when setting up a wiki or any other application, I see some issues that may affect a learner in the choice made. Each choice is programmed in a different manner. The look and feel on the screen is different. The steps and processes required for setting up secured fields, different levels of security access, valid users, protected sections, etc. differs from panel to panel. What seems to be clearly written to some, may not be to someone else, kind of like reading a foreign language. These differences may not be an issue for those who breath and speak GUI (grapical user interface), but for those who do not day in and day out do so, it can be overwhelming and very time-consuming. Let us not forget that there are more than 8 modalities of learning and learning many of these new applications are in the self-learn category. At times the interactivity is not very intuitive either.

Some sample wikis ideas for use in the classroom, by teacher, the team or the department:

For students, wikis like http://wedderburn-grade34.wikispaces.com/The+Ocean can be setup for them to show their research on different science topics or read up on it, or to link up with sites to practice certain skills like skip counting in math. Student work can be available for a larger audience.

Teachers can use or access wikis to track and get information on different library resources or access other links. Interactive and collaborative learning can be shared at the grade, department, or school level.