I really enjoyed creating the Wiki page for many reasons. First of all, it was really easy to create my own page. I wrote everything in Microsoft Word first for spelling and grammar check then was able to paste it into the wiki and reformat it without much difficulty. As with any process, there was some time necessary to learn how to center photos, justify text, add captions, create an organized table of contents, and create a discussion area. After the initial time investment, the page came together quickly.
Writing collaboratively gave us the ability to create an awesome resource of instructional design models & theories that would have been far too difficult for one person to create (within 10 weeks while working full-time jobs.) It is actually amazing to step back and see what all my classmates and I have created in a short period of time. The only weaknesses that I can see with writing collaboratively though the use of a wiki is that when two people are modifying the same document at the same time, saving the changes becomes an issue. I had this happen while working on the Kirkpatrick/Hamblin page; I’m not sure what happened to the other person working on the page but I can only hope they had their work saved on Word or another program first. I didn’t receive a notification or anything when another person began to edit the document.
I am fairly convinced that I will use a wiki in my physics classes for my students to create elaborate laboratory reports. Just how Tim O’Reilly described Web 2.0 tools, using a wiki for lab reports will become richer as more people use them because we’re harnessing the collective intelligence. I can assign each group a specific part of the lab report to complete: purpose/ hypothesis, background information, procedures, data collected, data analysis, results/conclusions. My students could create an awesome lab report in one class period. I would rotate sections so by the end of the semester, all groups have completed each section of a lab report. This fits well with our understanding of Generation Z- they are creative and want to form communities online. Why not let them work collaboratively to make one giant, awe-inspiring lab report that they would never be able to do alone in that short amount of time? This could also produce dynamic reports with images, videos, discussions, and other opportunities not available in traditional lab reports… I’m excited.
No comments:
Post a Comment