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| I can upload videos from blocked Sites like YouTube to view at home. |
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This is the Home page that welcomes visitors. |
I think this wiki stuff is interesting. It looks like there are several functions in this easy to use application that makes my life easier while engaging my students more. For example, if I assign my students a group assignment, their wiki page can be a common area. If they want to discuss class topics, there is a discussion area that looks pretty similar to a university style forum. What's good about that is... no new accounts to keep track of or log into! Then there's the notification tab. Whenever, wherever I am, I can be alerted to changes students make. In that way, if someone is trying to sabotage the efforts of the group by – let’s say – deleting everything, I’ll know it. And because Wikispaces keeps copies of all the edits, the information can be restored. All in all, this is a promising tool…
So I have decided to give Wikispaces a try. My students are safe in this virtual environment. (WordPress is out because the site is blocked at my school site.) So Wikispaces is it! With the complimentary plus plan for teachers, I can protect my students much better than if I had asked them to create a blog because I can restrict access.
So far I have a welcome page, two videos and my first assignment. My only concern after getting all excited about this Wikispaces was whether or not my students and I could access it at school. Well guess what! We can. Here’s a partial list of the planned activities with Wikispaces I can’t wait to try!
· Have weekly discussion posts in place of paper homework assignments. (I’m saving trees and myself from the hassle of tracking student work and oh yeah, I can LOCK posts after deadline!)
· Post movies/slideshows associated with stories or concepts we learn. This means they get to take the classroom home with them and makes parental help easier for parents. There’s nothing like trying to help your child with an assignment they can’t explain. In a word – AGGRAVATING!
· Link important URLs to students for resources. How many times have you heard, “I couldn’t find the website.” No more miscopied URLs or excuses. Yaaay!
· Invite parents to join. In fact, I am offering students extra credit if their parents get in on our conversations. Talk about added perspective.
· Celebrate student achievements and post pictures of Student of the Day, Week or Month.
Isha!! Great Job! I really like the ideas that you put forth with Wiki. I will be implementing Wiki and you gave me some great ideas in how to do it. I think we need the accountability factor that it brings in knowing who deleted what because kids will be kids, let's face it, they do these things. It is not right, but they do it.
ReplyDeleteIshia this looks like a great tool to use in class to encourage students to collaborate and extend class discussion. I really like the option where you can lock the post after the deadline! Makes managing the assignments and due dates so much easier and kids love to be online doing things. I have been blogging with my kids and they love it. Wiki spaces seems like a really valuable tool. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteThis is so very weird that I came to this review.....I was just thinking about learning more on this medium!
ReplyDeleteI have no real information about wiki pages at all and though I have been very much a proponent recently of blogging, I had never really thought of the concept of Word press being blocked by a school.
I appreciate you review and insight and you have cut my research on this in half....Thanks a bunch!
Great job on the wiki. I created one last year and just did not understand it. But I like your explanation and think I will give it another try. Also the tool I researched this week Zoho.com has the option to create a wiki as well. This must me an omen for me buckle down and get creative. These days students need all they can get and it is good that we have the opportunity to expose them to so much and give them options to create and think outside the box.
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