Module 4: Wikki-di Wikki-di Wak… (or Wikki-Wikki-Way-Cool-Man?)

  

http://img.thedougie.com/assets/imgx/5/1/6/2/6/6/1/orig-5162661.jpg

(I’m sorry, I had to honor the late Jam Master Jay, a pioneer of musical technology far ahead of his time.)

Wikis are everywhere, though most people I know are only aware of the big wiki: Wikipedia.I was happy to read an entire article based solely on Wiki. It’s a topic that I consistently lie to myself by pretending to know what it’s all about, when in fact I don’t. I get Wikipedia, but with all the references this quarter to wikis as part of Web 2.0, I was beginning to realize that maybe there was more to wiki than an encyclopedia that students can’t cite in a research paper. Plus, as a bonus, I learned more about what it means to be Web 2.0!(Below is another Wikipedia article…in case you’re interested.)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/technology/internet/25wikipedia.html   

From reading through the other VoiceThread posts, I get the idea that Wiki can be used to help students explain HOW they know something, as opposed to just KNOWING something. JJ in particular points out the importance of this deep understanding for her kids. But I still don’t quite understand just how wikis, using the collaborative process, help students achieve this.

 Wiki refers to on-line informational sharing that abandons (or at least moves away from) the idea of an authoritative editor. Essentially, editorial responsibilities are shared by the users. Wikipedia is the most famous as an encyclopedia created and edited by its users, whose impact on society has grown to monolithic proportions. The research paper, The Wiki Way of Learning, by Alison Ruth and Luke Houghton, looked at wiki’s potential role in the classroom, and some of the upside and downside. One big upside is lessening the workload of the teacher and relinquishing some power to the students. But one downside, which I contribute to at times with an 11 pm post, is the idea that, if you’re expected to edit and respond to others’ information by a deadline, what if they don’t post until the deadline? From the article: “Another student from the same cohort questioned how collaboration could occur: If people upload their page late (close to the due date) how I can edit it on time. I found that most of the students write their assignment on MS Word first then later they upload it. I might not have enough time to do it” (p. 142). 

I really do appreciate the upside of a wiki and its potential impact on my classroom, but I have a really difficult time seeing me actually pulling one off successfully, to the point where it can positively impact my students without getting in the way of taking the place of everything else we’re trying to do.

Ruth, A., & Houghton, L. (2009). The Wiki Way of Learning. Australian Journal of Educational Technology. Published

2009, 25 (2), 135-152.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/technology/internet/25wikipedia.html   

http://img.thedougie.com/assets/imgx/5/1/6/2/6/6/1/orig-5162661.jpg

Tags: collaborative learning, EDTC6536, Jam Master Jay, technology in the classroom, VoiceThread, Web 2.0, wiki, Wikipedia