Wikispaces for Teachers A Guide to Using a Wiki in Your Classroom Presented by Kim Rycroft and Teresa Harrison Learning Application Support Specialists Business & Learning Technologies

Workshop Objectives This workshop will: ●Give you an understanding of what wikis are and how they work in the context of K-12 education ●Provide you with an opportunity to create and edit your own wiki through guided instruction

Our Agenda ●Introduction ●A look at the OCDSB wiki ●What’s a wiki? ●Exploring others’ wikis ●Working with your own wiki ●Creating teacher accounts ●Permissions ●Add content and editing ●Customizing your wiki and managing your wikispaces account ●Using wikis in the classroom ●Tips and Ideas

The OCDSB Wiki ●Houses many of our workshop resources ●Organized by workshop topic ●To access it: ●Open Internet Explorer ●Click Teacher Resources on the splash page ●Scroll down to the OCDSB Wiki ●Take a few minutes to explore

So What is a Wiki Anyway? ●“Essentially, a database for creating, browsing, and searching through information that seeks to involve the visitor in an ongoing process of creation and collaboration that constantly changes the website landscape.” The Wiki Way: Quick Collaboration on the Web Addison-Wesley, 2001, Ward Cunningham and Bo Leuf

What’s a Wiki? ●A website that allows you to easily create and edit web pages ●What differentiates wikis from other websites? ● Collaboration (Multiple people can contribute to the same website) ● Access (When you are the owner of a wiki, you can decide who is able to view and edit your pages ●Wikis in plain english ●

Wiki Trivia ● Wiki is a Hawaiian term that means ________. ●The first wiki was developed in ______. ●The largest and most famous wiki is ___________. “fast” Wikipedia 1994 a “perpetual work in progress” 236 languages 2.6 million english articles 684 million visitors 10 million articles

Our Wiki of Choice ●We have chosen wikispaces ●Compatible with our version of Internet Explorer ●No advertising to distract from your content (with the educational account)

Examples of Wikis… ● ●Go to “ Examples of Educational Wikis ” ●Then click on any of the listed links to view that wiki

Examples of Wikis ●Chris Kesner at Earl of March S.S. ● ● ●Basic Classroom Wiki for Elementary ●

Wikispaces Facts ●Over 135,000 K-12 teachers have wikis on Wikispaces ●Educators can sign up for free ●Wiki pages are created using a built-in visual editor resembling that of a word-processor ●You can set your own permissions…

Permission Levels ●Permissions determine who can see and edit your wiki ● You can choose from the following options: ●Public: Anyone can view or edit your wiki ●Protected: Anyone can view your wiki but only members can edit ●Private: Only members can view or edit your wiki

Setting up a Teacher Account ●Called the PlusPlan for K to12 ●Free to sign up ●No advertisements ●Must be for educational use ●Go to to applyhttp://

Signing Up on Wikispaces ●Go to: Your username is visible to others. The Wiki Name forms your wiki address: Determine who can see and edit your wiki. Used to recover forgotten password. Check off this box for the ad-free account.

After You Join… ●Close “Getting Started With Your Wiki” page:

Hands-On: Editing Your Wiki ●Let’s work with our new wikispace by: ●Editing the first page of the wiki ●Creating a new page ●Typing in some content ●Inserting an image ●Adding a link to a website

Editing Your First Page ●To edit the first page, click “ Edit This Page ”

Editing a Wiki Page ●Click the Edit This Page button at the top of your wiki ●Write the text you would like on your page ●You can format it with bold, underline, italics, headings, and more ●Once you are done editing, click Save

Creating a New Page ●Click “ New Page ” in the left-hand menu

Adding Web Links on Your Wiki ●Click Edit This Page ●Highlight the text you’d like to link & click on the earth icon in the toolbar ●Another window appears allowing you to create a link to another page in your space or another website (external) ●Click OK

Adding Images to Your Wiki ●Click Edit This Page ●Click the icon that looks like a tree ● Browse your computer for the image you would like and click Open ● Upload the chosen picture or file ●Place your cursor where you would like the image on the page ●Double click the image or file to place it on the page

Adding Media to Your Wiki ●Click Edit This Page ●Go to the icon of the TV in the toolbar ●Choose the type of object (widget) that you’d like to embed ●Follow the instructions for embedding each object ●Click Save

Additional Resources for Teachers ●Check out our K-12 Educational Community at: ● ●Wikispaces information for teachers: ● ●Handout: Getting Started With Your Wikispace

Accessing the OCDSB Wiki ●From Teacher Resources, click on OCDSB Wiki

Give it Some Thought… ●Based on the examples you have seen, how could you see yourself using a wiki with your students?

Helpful Wiki Information ●You can have multiple wikis (websites) under the same account ●Best Practice: Create a separate wiki for each subject (secondary)

In the Classroom… Ideas for new wiki users ●Post daily homework ●Share solutions to homework (e.g. math problems) ●Share educational resources and websites ●Post assignments, project outlines and other class work ●Display exemplary student work

In the Classroom Ideas for wiki collaboration ●Develop an “FAQ” on a current topic of study ●Participate in debates around a particular issue ●Discuss and respond to others’ thoughts about a novel ●Write a collaborative study guide for an upcoming exam

Other Ideas for Using a Wiki ●

Wiki Advantages ●Promotes communication between students, teachers, and parents ●An alternative to Desire2Learn, which costs money per student enrolment ●Flexibility to add weblinks, images, documents, media….

Creating Student Accounts ●For younger children, you can submit a list of students and desired passwords to: ● ●For older students, let them sign up for themselves

Wikispaces Size Restrictions ●Maximum file size that can be uploaded: 20 MB ●Maximum wiki size: 2 GB * With the educator wiki account