Wikispaces

After my first experience with Blogging, I took a year off classroom based social media and did some research. The prospect of starting 7 or 8 blogs in 2009 didn't appeal to me and I went in search of a means of creating my own webpage. A place where I could upload all of my presentations, word documents, sound files, videos, etc. I was initially confused. Did I have to build my own web page and host it, paying all the associated costs..?

No... I stumbled upon the wiki...

In late 2009 I started my first wiki, as a trial run for the following year and found it extremely useful. The wiki I have created this year allows me to prepare a new page for each of my subjects and to link additional pages to each as required. Wikispaces also allows educators to upload and manage their wiki at no cost and I currently have 59 "files" uploaded onto my wiki.

Wikis are much more user directed. Rather than be constricted by the gadgets of a blog, the designer has much more control over the content and formatting. Images, videos, hyperlinks, and other content can all be formatted as required.

Some issues that I faced included:
* In order for my wiki to remain private, students need an account, email address and to ask permission to access my blog. Once this is done however, it is smooth sailing. I took about 30 minutes to get my class started.

* If I left my wiki public, it may be edited and changed by anybody = Public. There are a few issues associated with this; privacy, IP protection, etc.. I'm not too concerned about people using my work in their own classrooms, what I was worried about was people deleting my wiki content. I'm sure there are ways around this now, however I am yet to experiment with an open wiki. Comments and suggestions welcome..

* I fear that at the end of the year, I have to begin a new wiki because I would prefer to reveal only the current work to the students and add new content to the wiki as it becomes relevant. If you are happy for the content to stay on the wiki all year, then no dramas.

* Students still need a medium to create work of their own. Unless they are completing all classroom tasks in a workbook, they will need to begin a blog or wiki of their own which the teacher will need to access.


Some positive aspects I discovered included:
* One big winner with the wiki setup is the attached discussion tab. Students are able to discuss their work and "chat" on the wiki framework. I found that starting a discussion post each lesson allowed students to multi task, completing a classroom activity on the web (or otherwise) and talking about it via the discussion post. I found that they asked eachother questions, rather than myself if I was busy, and because I was the administrator of the discussion, I could monitor their discussions, deal with inappropriate comments and teach responsible use of the web.

* The freedom of the wiki is a big advantage. I was able to include all content and upload most file types that were needed for my classroom.


Please feel free to comment and leave suggestions for improvement.