This has been a long and busy week. I really don’t understand why my school has its Spring Break in March, because I could really use another one right about now. Despite my feelings of exhaustion this week, I was able to find a very interesting research based article out of a University in Canada examining the features and criteria for selecting and using wikis in education. As part of my attempt to coalesce my ideas about wikis, I wanted to determine a way to evaluate the selection of a wiki for educational use. Some of the things that I believe are important in determining if a wiki should be used in education is cost, usability, and privacy controls. In education, funding is always something that must be considered, however there are a number of wikis that are free for educators. How easy a wiki is to use for both the teacher and the students is very important. Teachers already have a lot of other things to deal with that are time consuming, so in order for technology to beneficial it should not add to the teachers workload and frustrations, instead it needs to be easy to update and maintain to make it feasible for most teachers. The other issue that must be considered before using a wiki in the classroom is privacy controls. In order to protect our students, teachers need to make sure that they have the ability to password protect their wiki in order to prevent just anyone from commenting on your class wiki. The article I read this week identified these as well as other criteria. They came up with an interesting list of consideration for choosing a wiki as well as other considerations that need to be made for implementing wikis in education. One consideration that the report notes is the formatting of each wiki is different and for on you might need to know html, while another wiki might just require you to click a button. This is something I considered when creating my own classroom wiki. I have limited knowledge of html, and most of my students have even less knowledge of html, so I had to find a user friendly wiki. So I don’t think that this is a problem, because there are so many different wikis and choices now that most people can find a wiki that suits their formatting needs. Another idea that the report introduced that I thought was interesting was the fact that unlike thread discussions it is often difficult to see who the editor of a wiki is, so that credit can be appropriately given. One thing I did to counter this issue with my class wiki is that I have students sign in with their name and password to the wiki and then when they edit PbWiki sends me an e-mail with the name of the person editing and which information they changed or added, so I can give credit. That is how I approached this issue, however with a larger class or a school-wide wiki this is something that must be considered and addressed.
I thought this report presented an interesting look at wikis and educational use.
Technical Evaluation Report - Educational Wikis: features and selection criteria: http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/163/244
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2 comments:
Megan - you had a great idea of how to show the work of the students. Do you look at the wiki, and check your emails? Does this take long? Are students put off by doing it and then reporting that they have completed the task? Just gathering thoughts so that I can implement this in my classroom.
BTW - I totally agree with you on the spring break. I could really use a week right about now. Only 7 weeks left of school now. That keeps me moving!
The considerations you have examined seem very logical and practical for K12 use in the classroom. The best evaluation technique I have found is my own application. When 7th grade students get their hands on it - some of the technical and privacy considerations seem even more important. I will use this as a guide when creating my next wiki – there are many things to consider in hindsight.
I especially liked the section on Educational Uses. Wenger suggested “some elements that are fundamental to the successful creation of wikis - among them, a virtual presence, a variety of interactions, easy participation, valuable content, connections to a broader subject field, personal and community identity and interaction, democratic participation, and evolution over time”. As it applies to my students and their learning – valuable content - would be what I would hope I could encourage my students to build through their participation.
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