Wikis... Think Pair Share

THINK: Reflections on the Process of Learning About Wikis.

This is my world; the new flat world of Web 2.0. This week I've spent an inordinate amounts of time thinking; thinking about wikis, thinking bout Web 2.0. thinking about the new world that I live in. I've been reading. I've been thinking. I've tried to use new language with my staff (with limited results). "What, a Wiki? A Vlog? Maybe the students can write a report? Sounds easier. And, by-the-way, what the heck is a tweet or a wordle or prezi?"


My collapsed world (as seen in the collapsed balloon) reflects a wiki world that is slowly inflating and is also flat. Wikis are are phenomenal educational tool that I have never used. Other than searching on Wikipedia, my Wiki world was non-existant. It certainly was not about my participation; it was, like the Web 1.0 I was familiar with, a repository of information for me, not for me as a contributor.




The beginning: I learn to think and realize that there has been a world-tilting change occuring in in our technological world. Once again, our world is flat. Imagine the shock of our scientists! More and more, technology experts are claiming this new knowlege. The world is no longer round; it has become flat, accessible and globally collaborative.

What does that mean? I am disposed to think about this in terms of wikis as well as other Web 2.0 resources. I've been proud to feel my mind is expanded, like the mid millenium thinkers, I knew the world was round, I've accepted the sciences that led to our understanding of the spherical nature of our world. Shockingly, I've read over and over again in my readings about WIKIS that our world is once again flat. Have I regressed to the middle ages? What does this mean? Shall I punch out my globe? If I do, will I see only an entire world or will I be able to look beyond our northern hemisherical thinking to embrace an entire planet.

I explored Wikis from other schools and educators. I thought about the limitless potential there is for sharing and to use to inform, debate, discuss, learn, and develop whrough a collaborative sturucture. I saw Wikis from grade one to grade 12, from educators across the planet. I looked at thematic Wikis and multilingual news wikis and wikis designed for teachers to share. I've read Joyce Valenza's Wiki for librarians. I've seen Glogsters on Wikis. You can embed games on Wikis. There are wikis for everything and anything and I am just beginning to explore this new world. We can collaborate, we can share, we can organize and use wikis for instruction.

I have learned that there are similarities between a wiki and a blog: both can be public or private. Teachers canto set up private wikis for collaboration with students, staff or parents. Wikis allow for different pages, where blogs are liner and date sequenced. In a wiki, information is displayed in the order in which it is posted, not in reverse chronological order as it is on a blo

The challenge I have heard most often about Wikis is the fear of a lack of authority in the Wiki text. If anyone can say anything, then anything can be said. With teachers, I've heard this often about citing Wikipedia as a source.


Readers should check for citations, check for validating data from alternate sources, and should participate actively by joining Wikipedia and correcting entries that you believe erroneous. We must be teaching students to analyze critically everything they learn on the web; Wikipedia is an excellent source to modle this teaching with.



Our instantaneous access to global communicaiton, be it through Wikis, Blogs, or other Web 2.0 technologies, does lead to a question about what is nws? Is it the same news we used to see on the front page of the Globe or the Journal? News has become more personal and we access information based on our community and interests, and so some of the 'chatter' we see on the web, in Web 2.0, may not suit our interests. We have a choice what news we consume; there is just more of it and more variety. Even in the Journal, I choose what news I read. What is important to another (sharing their personal stories) may not be of importance to me. The new media allows us to share with small groups and to target audiences, to decide what news is relevant to us.

PAIR: Discussion of Wikis in Terms of My Own Personal Learning.

What is happening in Singapore this week is what matters to my school. What happens in San Diego matters in my school. We can learn fr0m each other. We are a collaborative world. Wikis are one of the the glues that can make this flat world unified. I began my learning as a thought and inquiry based project. Why do wikis work? Why do we use them? How are they applicable to my job? How will they enhance student learning? Are they worth my time? I read the resources. I read the trailfires. I read wikis and blogs and wikis again. Everything I read reinforced this idea.

I have been reflecting on how easy it has been to fall behind in the learning curve when it comes to new technologies. We become content with our body of knowledge and our strategies and tools that we are using. Wikis have been around for a while, but they are new to the majority of teaching staff.

In Wiki Technologies and a Return to Rigor, Michael Roe wonders why the technologies we actively share in our world are missing from the classroom? I believe it is not a matter of active decision making, but a matter of lack of knowledge. We need to be continually sharing our new learnings with staff, as teacher librarians and as classroom teachers. The role we play in school libraries is to continually be learning and facilitating the learning of our staff.

Some argue that technologies are missing from our classrom due to lack of hardware and software. Yet, according to webtoold4U2Use, wikis require no knowledge, no hypertext, are easy to monitor, are easy to share, are free, work on old computers, facilitate collaboration, work on slow internet connections; in other words, are accessible and possible in just about any learning community. The missing link, I propose, not to be a neanderthal, is the lack of proper support in the school community to understand the role and possibliities in open to teachers, and further, to extend my thesis, the lack of a teacher librarian to facilitate the dissemination of knowledge both to students and to teachers.

Tony Keefer writes, in his article Web2.0 tools for the Classroom, in Choice Literacy.com, that when writing is authentic, when studetns are writing for an audience, then they do not feel like they are doing writing. It seems to me that a part of my job, then , is to inservice teachers about this, to provide opportunities to make writing authentic and real. When studetns are writing for an audience, as a Wiki certainly provides, then they know they are being read, perhaps by a global audience. Teachers cannot be expected to know new technologies and platforms; my job it seems is to disseminate and assist in some of that collaborative learning. This really supports the emerging division of labour in school libraries of an 80 / 20 split between technology support and library support, as 21st Century literacies are explored. My job is an evolving one.

On a purely personal level, I see Wikis becoming a very powerful tool in a political sense, allowing constituents to express thei ideas and have an open dialogue in communities that have lost that community cohesion... where town hall meetings are unusual and where we don't all meet at the cloak room of our children's schools. Wikis can be an effective tool to build a political dialogue.

SHARE: Reflections on Wikis in Teaching and Learning.

Many middle and high school staffs have computer technologists, have library techs, and yes, even have teacher librarians (apologies to the American trend to label teacher librarians as librarians... I KNOW WE all know the difference). Those that have qualified educators that are also librarians are often so oversubscribed in terms of responsiblities that our roles can be diminshed. I perform a full time job as a teacher librarian in a point four time... We must keep up with the myriad of library and educational responsibilities that exist for us and now it is clear to me that we must also make sure that we share continually the new learning and technologies that make literacy engaging and authentic. I imagine I could create a VERY LARGE facebook group of cohorts who are feeling that their responsibility cup is full!

Teachers and students need support to enter into new methods of learning. Computer technologists tend to work on the technical side, building our capacity and fixing our problems and adding links to our hardare. Teacher librarians teach how to integrate new tools into critical learnings, and in such, are the instigators of a future world of techno -savvy, inquiry based, knowledge based collaborative learning.

If authentic writing engages the student; if authentic writing includes writing for a real audience, then Wikis are an ideal tool to build that authenticity with colaboration and a wide participatory audience. We can be united by new technology as a means to bring engagement to literacy learnings (engagement being a primary AISI focus both for Alberta Education and Edmonton Public).

New technologies such as wikis allow us to move outside the box and meet student needs and build engagement. Everyone who contributes to the wiki has ownership and, as a result, is more invested in a project. Wikis have the potential to differentiate for learning in ways that traditional tools could not.

Ken Haycock suggests that we co-create content and this builds engagement. It is our professional responsiblity to make this happen with students. Students at all levels need to be leaders, to teach and to be taught. Wikis clearly open this opportunity to students. Literature circes are shown to be an excellent example of co-creative work as people co-create content. http://wandawiki.wikispaces.com/.

In different groups in literature circles. students of all levels of proficiency have opportunities to be leaders, to teach, and be taught by other group members. Sharing their work and learning on Wikis enhances the literature circle enormously and builds more accountability.

Yet, despite all this positive rhetoric, I am still left with the question as to how we make this work in a classroom that has limited technological access. Students co-create content, yet if they have limited access to computers, this obstacle is not just untimely, but seems insurmountable in many classroom situtations.

Classes often are scheduled into limited lab time, there is little access to adequete classroom technology, and hardware is often problematic. Yet, as I stated earlier, wikis require no knowledge, no hypertext, are easy to monitor, are easy to share, are free, work on old computers, facilitate collaboration, work on slow internet connections; in other words, are accessible and possible in just about any learning community. Wikis can continue to be worked on in the home, as they are not limited to school platforms and will work on vitrually any computer. Students can continue to collaborate, learn, and produce at school and at home.

Wikis will encourage participation by quieter students. The online world engages students 24/7 and leads to generative learning and investigation. Students feel an ownership and will take a greater when theri work is shared.

Wagner (2008) argues beyond the technical limitations, there are needs to balance standardization that limits students ability to critically think. Standardizing (accountability pillars, testing) prevent teachers taking risks. To compete globally, student must show:
1. Critical thinking and problem solving; 2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence; 3. Agility and adaptability; 4. Initiative and entrepreneurialism; 5. Effective oral and written communication; 6. Accessing and analyzing information; and 7. Curiosity and imagination. All these skills are intrinsic to using collabotartive, authentic tools like wikis.


Wikis at Wikispaces cater to education, as they have no age restriction. Teacher control of content is easy. Since Wikis and Blogs can strengthen reading and writing skills and teach students about the new literacy of the Internet age, I am collaboratively planning a wiki with the Grade six science teacher, Rayna Arndt. The cross curricular Science / Language Arts / Technology project will focus on careers in forensic science. We are at the stage right now of building the inquiry questions that the students will use and planning the Wiki setup. As well, the grade six class will be working on social studies using a wiki. In pairs (to show collaboration) students will pick a topic with two sides. In the wiki page, they will explore the pros and cons of the issue, usings internet research, and provide a conclusion supported by their evidence. They will need to post pictures, use links, cite sources, be collaborative, add a wordle or glogster and comment on other's pages (modeled after this course structure). They will present to the class to combine in oral skills. I will be using pbworks.com for this project, partly to compare to the wikispaces in a real environment, and partly as it has been recommended as easier for students to use.

In order to build my competencies in Wiki - making, I have set up a very basic Wiki for our staff. Few know at this point how to use a Wiki, so I have chosen to build a Wiki that increased dialogue, input and collaboration in the library. The Wiki has pages for Collaborative Unit notes, for acquisition suggestions, for listing of Web 2.0 tools, and as time evolves the wiki, more will be added. At this point, only one staff member has been introduced to it but I suspect that it will be valued and there will be thoughtful suggestions toward its development.

In "Library 2.0," Harris (2006) talks about the use of blogs, podcasts, and other Web 2.0 applications in the literature and reading promotion efforts of teacher-librarians. Says Harris, "The heart of the concept, though, is not about the tools, but rather the communities and the conversations that they make possible".

Unlinked Resources Used:

Boeninger, Chad F. (2007) "The Wonderful World of Wikis: Applications for Libraries." Library 2.0 and Beyond. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

Dreon, O., & Dietrich, N.. (2009). Turning Lemons into Lemonade: Teaching Assistive Technology through Wikis and Embedded Video. TechTrends, 53(1), 78-80. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1680515581).

Christopher Harris. (2006, May). SCHOOL LIBRARY 2.0. School Library Journal, 52(5), 50-53,9. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1041606431).

Imperatore, C.. (2009, March). Wikis and Blogs: Your Keys to Student Collaboration & Engagement. Techniques, 84(3), 30-31. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1667558511).

Learning and Teaching in WANDA Wiki Wonderland: Literature Circles in the Digital Commons. Teacher Librarian, 37(2), 23-28. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1938481291).

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Roe, M.. (2010, January). WIKI TECHNOLOGY and the return to rigor. Leadership, 39(3), 20-22. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1951887201).