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Taught by Edward F. Gehringer from NC State (Associate Professor of Computer Science)

Advantages of Wiki’s

• Co-editing: Howework done on wiki’s promote collaboration between students
• Co-assembly: Different people can contribute different parts
• Write more than a traditional word document
• Don’t have to worry about location and version (it’s all online and available)

Pitfalls

• Other’s can “deface” wiki pages (bots) - Precreate accounts and disable login, or don’t put links in public_html space.
• Some techonlogy-adverse students have trouble learning to use wiki’s
• Under FERPA, students need to consent for their required work to be posted publicly.
• Some students are uncomfortable with public writing
• Wiki’s use their own markup language, wich is not as flexible in HTML

Assessing Wikis

• Instructor/TA assessment (but there is a lot to go through and it can be time consuming)
• Student Assessment - Students write up short commentaries on their contributions and collaborations and suggest a grade.
• Wikis are new, so not everyone assesses …
• Peer Assessment - Score authors based on a rubric. (This seems to be the best in his opinion)

Advantages to Peer Assessment

• Adds a new dimension to collaboration
• Electronic peer review of wiki contribution like real world and real job.

Types of Assignments:

• Posting Links to other online resources
• Posting an assignment (using links to online resources and articles)
• Collaboration on Research Project
• Post class notes
• Comments on Articles
• Vocabulary List
• Research Report
• Online Debates
• Class Discussions
• Peer Review
• Really almost anything that can be done online…

There is a correlation between those that do a type of research assignment and those that responded that the wiki had helped them “think critically.”

How this might be important at UNC-CH and for me:

I support several foreign language departments and I think that the literature courses could really benefit from a classroom space where they can discuss what they are reading and link off to other spaces.

The real beauty of a wiki is that it is a webpage that is being built in real time.

I can also think that departments that need a lot of coordination could use a wiki to get stuff together. It is always updated and always available… at least on our campus.

Anyone at UNC want to get together and talk more?