CT 2008 - Avoid a Wiki Wasteland

Avoid a Wiki Wasteland: Learn How Wikis Work in Higher Education by Robert E Cummings, July 31^st, 2008

Used mediawiki and pbwiki

What is a wiki anyway?

-wikis are not Wikipedia even if Wikipedia is a wiki.

-Wikipedia is the largest wiki

-simplest definition is “a web site which users can edit”.

-most wikis require registration before user people can make edits or if not then your content is buried in SPAM

History

-1^st wiki, May 1, 1995. Hillside.net Patterns List Cunningham developed a listserve that had history. Came up with wiki format. He wanted casual writing style.

Why would I want to have wikis on my campus?

-Purpose for creating and disseminating original knowledge.

Successful wikis on college campuses

1. Involve large numbers of students across courses and disciplines
2. Create meaningful interactions with web users beyond adopting courses
3. support authentic research
4. are durable, and outlast the semester

What are the different types of wikis on campuses?

1. Internal or external?

Top 20 Most Hotly Revised Wikipedia Articles

Jesus, Adolf Hitler, October 2003 (edit compute glitch caused it to rise to top), Nintendo revolution, hurricane Katrina, India, runeScape, anarchism, Britney Spears, Playstation3, ,etc…

Mark Phillipson’s Wiki Taxonomy

1. resource wiki
2. presentation wiki
3. gateway wiki
4. simulation wiki
5. illuminated wiki

1. The Resource Wiki

-repository of information

2. Presentation Wiki

-serves as collection point but differs with audience. Cheaply used inside the class but focus is not beyond the class.

3. Gateway wiki

-acts as collaboration of idea that stands apart (metrics, data sets, etc…) discovered data with discussion. Once collected and stored then transitions from collection to interpretation and presentation. Purpose usually with scientific courses.

4. Simulation wiki

-designed to explore and unfold a situation. Example is the holocaust wiki project. Engages through role playing.

5. Illuminated wiki

-focuses on communal mapping and object analysis. Less formal presentation and is work in progress but communal markup of source documents.

Why is it important for IT departments to support wikis in the classroom?

Why is it important to use them?

Yochai Benkler “Coase’s Penguin, or Linus and the Nature of the firm”. Benkler’s work talks in macro terms about what is going on culturally. Worker sends products to market – market sends signals to worker ast to what it finds valuable, usually in the form of prices. (Market Model of Production) example - farmer

(Firm Model of Production) Worker reports to manager and manager makes decision. Example – manager at factory

(Commons – Based Peer Production)

-Conditions….

*Costs of fixation are low

*Costs of publication are low

*All information is public

Example? No manager, group project contribution based on interaction. Work has to be modular for it to work. Each contributes own piece. Has to be granular – do as much or little as you want to do. Have to achieve low cost integration. CBPP project. Example – Wikipedia

Market – Audience

1. Market Model – replace market with audience to get “blog”
2. Firm Model-replace market with audience to get “nytimes.com”
3. CBPP Model-replace market with audience to get electronic network, includes wikis (and social networks such as myspace and facebook)

Why not use a blog or LMS?

1. Wikis create an electronic version of disciplinary knowledge community in which students participate
2. Wikis can remove teachers as the audience and replace them with a genuine audience
3. Participating in a wiki, students are asked to judge their content in terms of the project’s needs and not just what the know.
4. Participation in a wiki places maximum value on student creativity

Conclusion – Wikis are the platform which offer your students the best chance to develop collaborative skills for electronic environments.