Week 2 - Making a Wiki

My Wiki! Click to Visit

For me, Wikis have always symbolised the meaning of collaboration. Like any collaborative piece of work a wikis ownership boasts no singular person whereas blogs are similar but rely on a hierarchical style of contribution. It is this group mentality of a wiki and the ability to contribute even the smallest piece of information that gives people a great sense of effective contribution.

One of the most successful Wikis out there has been the Wikipedia a wiki which has been developed as an encyclopedia. This wiki alone boasts 14,000,000 pages of shared and contributed information from around the globe and is a shining example of the power of collaborative websites.

Using Wiki Spaces, was incredible easy. I was able to embed gifs and a teachertube.com video in a matter of seconds. The ability to quickly and easily change and update information on the fly gives wikis a valued place within the classroom. I think the biggest difference between a blog and a wiki at the moment for me is the ease of use. To allow your students to use the site and to use it well, the removal of problematic things such as HTML coding I believe is the winning point when we compare a wiki and blog.

According to Geekgirl.com the biggest problem facing many people who build a wiki is they do not have a clear goal for the wiki. Rose states that many of the wikis do not work not because of technical or skill shortages but because the "reason for collaborating via a wiki has not been clearly defined". Thus when considering the use of a wiki at school we must consider this purpose for the use of a wiki. As with most new learning that students face, we will face the question, "Why are we doing this?". So that is my question to my followers! Why do you think a wiki is useful and who would you use it in the classroom?

A Useful Link below showing Wikis currently in use
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wikis