According to Vanderbilt
University’s Center for Teaching, a wiki is “a collaborative tool that allows
students to contribute and modify one or more pages of course related
materials.”
I’ve only been familiar
with wikis since entering into this program. Looking back I now notice
different schools and clubs that utilized them early only, but I’ve never had
any real hands on experience.
Viewing the Cobb County Library Media Wiki, I was
amazed at how thorough and organized the wiki was. For media specialist, it’s
vital to not only stay organized but to also have common information easily
available to patrons. On their site I simply look to the right and see “Reading
Promotion Programs”, “Volunteer Information”, and Common Core information. For
this school, their wiki provides a great deal of information that parents or
students would have needed to search or call for.
Taking into account my
personal group experience and reading the other articles, the collaborative
aspect of wikis makes them a powerful tool in the media center. For one of my
group projects last semester we used a wiki among four people and found it
very successful for collaborating. Among our group members, any information seen
that was incorrect or needed to be edited was easily corrected by another group
member. If someone didn’t have access to the wiki, you could quickly send your
information to another team member and they would post it. These are all very
basic examples, but at its core wikis are one of the best collaborative tools
available to us.
Speaking of
collaboration, we learn so much about the importance of collaboration and how
difficult it can be for media specialist to get feedback. I had no idea going
into this program how hard a media specialist has it when trying to get on one
accord with teachers and faculty.
To quote “7 things you should know about…Wikis”:
“…wikis allow faculty
and students to engage in collaborative activities that might not be possible
in a classroom. Their flexibility will encourage broader adoption-by both
students and faculty.”
In the same breath, one
set back I find with wikis is in giving access to multiple people and having
the risk of untrue information being published to the public. Look no further
than one of the most known and read wikis…Wikipedia!
A teacher told our class
during undergraduate that if you want to use Wikipedia as source you might as
well ask 10 random people off the street. Everyone has access to this
information, and with that has the access to change the information. While I do
think that Wikipedia can offer a great starting point for some topics, it also shows
how poorly information can be managed.
I believe keeping wikis heavily monitored
and updated weekly (if necessary) will keep it from becoming a storage locker
of information. Someone should definitely be put in place to monitor all wiki activity.
I imagine that someone being in charge of keeping the information accurate and
cut down on the useless information that may be present.
- http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/
- http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7004.pdf
- https://cobbk12-org.campuspack.net/Groups/CI_Library_Media_Education_-_Spinks/Cobb_Library_Media_Wiki
- http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7004.pdf
- https://cobbk12-org.campuspack.net/Groups/CI_Library_Media_Education_-_Spinks/Cobb_Library_Media_Wiki
I also did not have a lot of prior wiki experience before entering the school library media program. I believe I had to do a wiki with a group for a project in one of my undergrad classes but that has been 8 years ago so much of my knowledge was refreshed during these courses. It was so easy to be able to work in a group and have one common place where we could all post our ideas and parts of a project and the others could edit anything they saw that needed touching up. It was also efficient because you did not have to wait on people to respond to group emails. The Cobb Library Media Wiki was a great resource to look at. Thank you for posting the information. It does make it much easier to find information when it is all in one place and efficient for your patrons to locate.
ReplyDeleteWikis are a great tool to use in the media center. I had never really thought of using them that much at the elementary school level but I think they would be an excellent tool for the gifted classes that are constantly coming into the media center and working on group projects. I think I am going to bring this idea up to the gifted teacher and see how she feels about letting them be my guinea pigs. I really liked the idea that you brought up about have a school wiki for faculty and staff members to be able to collaborate and stay on the same page about activities. And, yes, the wiki should be monitored and checked for accuracy often.
Well I knew nothing about wiki's before entering the program, but since then have used them as a tool to find educational resources and also various other topics.
ReplyDeleteI like to use Wikipedia as my introduction into knowledge about a topic, but rarely use it as a resource for the reason you simply stated-anyone can add, change, and delete information. I have found it to reliable with general background information.
I like wiki's because you create something and other people can add their to it. This is why it is good for collaborative projects. So far since being in this program, I have had to create 3 wiki's and all have served different purposes. I learn something new every time. Thank you for posting the information about Cobb's wiki for media specialists as I did not know of it before hand.
I am with you! I knew nothing of wiki's before starting the program, and I am still concerned regarding how to use it as an administrator. I think that it would be a valuable tool for students to use, especially in the middle school level. I completely agree with you regarding the monitoring of the program. I would think that there would have to be some type of system that you could put into place to make sure that students are keeping up with their assignments and/or not disrupting the proper use of the program.
ReplyDeleteI am another newbie to the wiki! I haven't ever used one before this class but have enjoyed reading and seeing how they can be used with the students and teachers for collaboration purposes. They can really become a neat tool for sharing information with others and building a network of common interests between a particular group of folks. I do think when working with kids that you would need to review the rules for sharing and editing other friend's work so that there wouldn't be hard feelings if something was lost or changed. I'm sure it would also take practice using it with a group.
ReplyDelete