Thing #8

Wiki............hmmmmm..............

I understand what a wiki is. I see it's potential in the classroom! What is frustrating or maybe disappointing is the outside looking in final project. I love how the wiki's allow for collaboration and growth in the production, but in the end, the final products appear to be more like an informational website - ho hum...

Now, if I were using this in my class, such as CoolCat Teacher did, I am sure that my passion for the topic and the tool would be MUCH more enthusiastic.

I visited the Kindergarten Counting Book Wiki. The end result just looked like a website with pictures on it. However, I'm sure that during the creation of this counting expedition the teacher and students were so excited about getting to use an interactive technology tool. So, as I said before, from the outside looking in, this isn't very exciting. Maybe if I could just muster up the strength to start one for my school, I could find infinite uses for the wiki!

I did visit the Primary Math wiki and then branched off into one of the first grade blogs. It was a very current blog that showed what the students were actually learning. Again, this was a blog and not a wiki. The actual wiki was a place where each of the classrooms posted the link to their blog.... I think I like the blogging much better - I always end up there!

The Schools in the Past wiki was kind of neat, allowing teachers, parents, grandparents and students to all give input in real time on one document for all to see. I thought that was a neat way to use the technology!

I struggle with ideas about how to use this with my school, right now. Maybe more ideas will come to me as I view more and more of them!