What’s a wiki anyway? Watch this introductory video to find out, and read the overview provided by NWP, Digital Toolbox: Wikis.
Why use a wiki?
This is the question. The answer depends entirely on your needs. Wikis can be public or private collaborative spaces between administrators, teachers, parents, students, or some combination thereof. They can also serve as websites with only certain areas open for collaborative editing. Our own wiki fits into this last category, where members are allowed to edit the Summer Institute pages, but not other restricted areas of the site.
One Idea for Classroom Use
Despite being a great place for authentic, real-world research, Project Citizen could also serve as a great way to venture into collaborative research projects through the use of wikis. My good friend, Terra Mahre, has completed this project with her seventh-graders for several years with outstanding results. Group wikis, linked to a teacher moderated classroom wiki, could work to manage this kind of collaborative research project.
Wiki platforms to consider for education
- Wetpaint: Easy to navigate, organize and manage, Wetpaint offers ad-free wikispace to qualifying educators. With the option to keep your wiki private, this is a good platform for classrooms with students 13 and up (Wetpaint restricts users under 13 because of COPPA). The editing history on Wetpaint sites is a little less searchable than other platforms, but for more advanced users, this platform offers more baubles, whistles, and knobs, as well as organizational drop down menus that can prevent clutter on the navigation toolbar.
- PBworks: Previously called PBwiki (as in, as easy as peanut butter and jelly) PBworks is the new and revised version of their free, teacher moderated wikispace. I prefer this platform for first time users, because of it’s clearly recorded history and simple design.
- Wikispaces: Like almost all wiki platforms, this one provides free classroom spaces, and a simple, easy-to navigate workspace. Personally, this is my least favorite of the three that I’ve listed here. I find that there are too many editing tools available, when a few simple ones would do. I know there are plenty of educators that would disagree, so explore each and decide for yourself.
A few places to find examples of classroom wikis
- EduWikis: A great overview of educational wikis, along with classroom examples.
- Teach2.0-What about Wikis: An evolving list of resources, including classroom examples (scroll to the bottom) and a SWOT analysis.
- Wetpaint Wikis in the Classroom: Browse the list of classroom wikis to get ideas for your own.
A Sample of Ancillary Programs:
What follows is a sampling of programs I’ve found useful in both my personal and professional life. While the county in which I currently work is still, shall we say, in the process of reviewing several of these resources for classroom use, many schools are already using them with their students and leading the way for the rest of us. You can either browse the recommended tools below, or search the Top 100 Tools for Learning 2009.
VoiceThread
Used along or in combination with a blog or wiki, VoiceThread allows users to post images, video, and comments (text or voice) to what are essentially interactive slideshow presentations. Although VoiceThread is relatively new, educators around the world (including our own Jennifer Dail) have snapped up some space for their own students. In addition to Jen’s expertise, there are some good online resources to consider when considering VoiceThread for your classroom. If you have sound on your computer, you can watch the VoiceThread introduction. There are lots of great tutorials on the site that will lead you through the basic in’s and out’s of the software. Voicethread4Education is a good place to start if looking for classroom examples.
SlideShare
Within my own county, SlideShare is blocked (at least as of Jan. 2009), but for the rest of you (and for those who don’t mind doing a little online work from home) SlideShare is the best new way to share slideshow presentations. You can embed slideshows right into your wiki, webpage, or blog without overwhelming your puny email inbox. And, with the option of adding narration and creating a SlideCast, your presentations can become multi-modal.
Gabcast
Record your voice from anywhere using a phone. Simple to set up, easy to manage, I’ve used this with my own classes to allows students to record narration for final drafts, piece together audio for digital projects, and record my own spur of the moment thoughts driving home. For classroom use, consider setting up separate channels, trying it out yourself, and then printing and passing out directions for a test run. Eventually, you may find that students can manage their own channels, or sign up themselves. You can also set up automatic posting to your blog, which could feed into your wiki for audio updates from the teacher. This biggest downside to this service is the inability to moderate comments as they come in. I haven’t found this to be a problem for my own classes, since I manage the channels myself, but be cautious in asking students (especially younger, less mature students) on how to manage their own channels if they sign up themselves.
Flickr
Flickr is an online photo sharing community that often works well in combination with wikis or blogs. On most platforms, you can embed flickr feeds, either from individuals or collaborative photo sharing groups. Many images are also geotagged, which could be a good way for inquiry driven research projects. I often use this site to search for images licensed by the Creative Commons to use in presentations and digital projects.
Wordle.net
Aside from just being pretty cool, Wordle can be used to preview a text, guide students in revision, and create cover art for final drafts. Simply copy and paste any brief passage (or heck, paste the whole student paper into it if you want) and see what emerges. Words that appear more often in the passage will be larger, while less frequent words are smaller. This can help students to see emerging themes in their work, identify areas for word variation, or provide a springboard to discussion where students predict what the text will be about.
Glogster.edu
Build interactive, digital multi-media posters that you can embed and share through your website, blog, or wiki. This is a great way to have students create interactive book reports, collect and share research, and present creative writing in a new way. While my own county has blocked this resource, many classrooms are making good use of this free, online tool. For more information, browse Glogster.edu or do an internet search for Glogster + education.
More options: Teach Web 2.0
The list of options continues to expand, almost daily. When you get to a place where you’re reader to explore some of the hundreds of other options being used in classrooms out there, check out TechWeb2.0. Better yet, join their wiki and add your own expertise to the collaborative space!
Filed under: KMWPsi09, NWP Digital Toolbox , embed, gabcast, glogster, pbworks, slidecast, slideshare, voicethread, wetpaint, wiki, wikispaces
JESS,
Thank you so much for making all of these wonderful resources seem relevant, logical, and easy. I hope that you will achieve this. I have a feeling I will be pulling up your posts in the coming months!
Wow!
Exciting, Jess. I want to talk about maybe using wiki’s to start our lists of descriptive words for prompts we come up with. For example, students can all add their two cents worth of words to a wikilist under a posted prompt, then the kids that don’t have words of their own can refer to this list to help them get going. We could even set up the wiki page on the laptop and ask them to come up and add their words like we do grammar ninja currently, then we can move to the next phase in Dawn’s process, showing them the next steps in succession and scaffold “the way” forward for them and promote collaboration along the way. Maybe we can even find a way to set up collaborative work among groups of students, maybe even with another KMWP teacher that has 7th graders like Nancy, Lindsay. I will look into the iEARN site like you mentioned. Love it!!!
Hi Johnny,
I’m not sure I understand all of what you’re proposing here, but I’m sure our face to face conversations will help clear everything up. It’s so wonderful to work with a supporting and enthusiastic teacher and all around lovely human being.
Jess,
Creating wikis is a very relevant tool. It could possibly replace many teacher-created websites. It allows collaboration between teachers and students, which would positively affect the learning environment.
Thanks for all of these helpful videos.
Jess, thank you for sharing all the ways to use the resources. I enjoyed exploring your delicious sites to use with the kids. Thanks!
Jess – Yes, thank you so much for all these resources! Much to read and digest. I am still in grade school when it comes to technology. Now I am off to learn how to save an article into delicious when I am not in the delicious site. I also need to upload an image into the wiki…and attempt to build a wiki myself.
I’m not really interested in using wikis in my classroom because of lack of time and my students need to learn more basic uses of technology first, like Word, PowerPoint, and google, for example. However, there are several things that I can use for planning lessons and eventually use with students in these posts.
My favorite thing I found in exploring today was wordle.net. I agree with you, Jessi, that it’s pretty cool and it could be used in writing projects. I think my students would love this site.
I went to edublogs.com to see about maybe using it in my classroom for blogging, but the website seems a little bit sketchy to me, so I might not use blogs with them. I’ll have to think of something else. I’m sure they would even like sending work as e-mails, but I’m not sure how old someone has to be to have e-mail (probably older than my students).
Hi Rita,
If you are interested in email for children, you may find some of the following resources useful:
Moderated Email
* Gaggle.net
* using the Gmail hack
* Zilladog–email for kids
* Writing for Real: Email in the Classroom
You might also explore the section on Privacy and Other Considerations that is posted on our wiki.
I loved all of these new technologies. I was so excited to get my RSS feed working as well as my delicious account. I can really use both to keep up with new ideas from other teachers. After all, most good teachers steal and adapt.