I have never used a wiki in my class but after developing a wiki in our spring class and writing a lesson plan for a wiki with this class, I am confident that I will be using a wiki this year. Wikis are a “convenient productivity tool, but there is nothing inconsequential about convenience and time saved in the classroom, or about a wiki’s ability to foster collaboration, review and revision among students” (Hendron, p. 175)
I have my students work with different groups on various projects many times throughout the school year. My kids do five major research projects during the year and four of these projects have some kind of group element to them. In the past, I have had students meet in their groups and they have to write things out on paper and then edit and revise. Then they have to rewrite it sometimes over and over again. With the use of a wiki, we will be able to save a lot of time and paper. Students will be able to go on the computer to type out their document. Each of the group members will be able to go in and add, delete, or change whatever needs to be done right there on the computer.
For this lesson plan, I used one of those research projects. The students work in city-state groups to research ancient Greece. Once each group member has completed their research, as a group they have to develop 20 multiple choice trivia questions. Each person has to write five questions for their topic that was researched. (These questions will be used later for a Greek Festival that we do.) My 6th graders always struggle with writing multiple-choice questions. It’s easy to write the question and answer but the distracter answers are always hard to write. Developing a wiki for this lesson, allows the students to go on and help each other write distracter answers for these multiple-choice questions. Each group wants to write the best questions, as these are the ones that will be used for the Greek Festival. The groups also have to go on the wiki to develop group cheers and costumes. I will check each wiki to make sure these things are appropriate for our Greek Festival.
The best part about using a wiki is they are free! I have done wikis on wikispaces and pbworks. Both programs work very well and they are pretty easy to use.
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I agree with you that the exposure to wikis through this program has me excited to utilize them in class. It sounds like an interesting project and the use of the wikis will enhance the collaboration of the students.
ReplyDeleteI am also having my students use a Wiki to help them work as a group on a reasearch project. After finding out how easy it is in previous classes, I have been really motivated to create a lesson in which the students could use one to collaborate! I really liked your idea of having them use their Wikis to help other students come up with answer ideas! I wish I had someone to help me come up with answer ideas when I am creating questions!
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like a fun project, and each student can take part in the typing and editing stages on a wiki, which will help everyone develop those needed skills.
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