One thing I like about the wiki environment is the ease of creating the links and that they can be organized into groups. It's a quick way to find things like using Wikipedia to find information. As we interact with the websites that we've put on our class wiki page we could possibly add comments to the references listed and build a knowledge base.
My understanding of the purpose of a WIKI in education is a way to collaborate and facilitate community-building within a course. The WIKI provides a way for a group to edit and contribute resources for the best practices in online teaching. According to the article from Vanderbilt.edu, “Wikis shift your students from ‘consumer of knowledge’ to ‘creators of knowledge,’ which is a great way to encourage your students to develop critical thinking skills, to learn from one another, and to improve their ability to work in groups.”
The only experience I have using a Wiki is Wikipedia and not as a contributor but as a user to gather information. I believe that monitoring the information presented in the WIKI becomes very important to maintain the integrity of it content. Membership is also important so contributors remember to follow the rules of online etiquette.
There are several ways a Wiki in education can be helpful. Collaborating on educational planning that gives staff and administration a place to see everyone’s agendas and progress on various documents. It’s a time saver as it’s no longer necessary to deliver materials to everyone’s mailboxes. Teachers can share course materials and the WIKI allows a conversation to continue through it’s discussion board. Students can create a virtual field trip. Back in grammar school we had an assignment to create a travel log of places we'd like to visit including interesting facts about the country chosen. Using a Wiki everyone in the class would benefit from the research rather than just the student and teacher. The resources that our class will be contributing to will be an asset to our Weebly websites.
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