Lesson Plans II
Intro to Wikis
Students at a Georgia private school collaborate online to learn
computer science.
Lesson description: As students learn different aspects of online safety, they post current information to a collaborative wiki page. Discussions about the topic approach occur on the discussions tab of the wiki.
- Students search for additional facts and hyperlinks to their sources.
- Students draft a storyboard and/or script for a proposed movie on the topic.
- Students create a video and, if approved, upload it to YouTube or Google Video.
- Students create a PowerPoint document using information from their wiki to present to the class. Students also show their videos to their classmates.
Subject area: This can be used in any high school-level computer class. Standards: This lesson meets the newly drafted ISTE standards (www.iste.org):
- Creativity and Innovation (Standards A, B, C, D)
- Communication and Collaboration (Standards A, B, D with peer collaboration only)
- Research and Information Retrieval (Standards A, B, C)
- Critical Thinking, Problem-Solving and Decision-Making (Standards A, B, C, D)
- Technology Operations and Concepts (Standards A, B, C, D)
Resources:
A class wiki, for example, westwood.wikispaces.com
Windows Movie Maker (free)
Audacity editing and recording software (free)
A video-recording device of their choice (class Web cams or a student’s video camera)
YouTube or Google Video, Microsoft Paint and Microsoft PowerPoint.
Grading Rubric: Students are graded by looking at the wiki itself and its history section, including the following aspects:
- Collaborative effort: The wiki history shows in detail every addition and deletion on each page. It allows the teacher to determine the exact contribution or lack thereof of each student.
- Hyperlinks to sources: A variety of hyperlinks are included to give the wiki credibility.
- Original, intelligent wording: The effective wiki summarizes information — using clear, intelligent wording — but never copies it. Jargon is not used. The wiki is targeted to a global audience.
- Effective use of video: The students are graded more on production of the video than perfection.
Teaching Tips
- Before beginning, set up a wiki and make sure students have established their user names and passwords. Wikispaces.com is a good site.
- Groups should have a basic understanding of wikis and be small enough (two or three people) to facilitate editing.
- Create the main page for your wiki project that links to the blank pages students will use.
- A video and other how-to instructions for beginners with wikis are available at k12onlineconference.org.
- Feedback from peer reviews may inspire more improvements to student videos than detailed assessment rubrics. ISTE standards mandate collaboration with other classes. Start connecting.
