1. …Using Wikis to promote collaborative learning
Wiki’d Thoughts…
…Using Wikis to promote collaborative learning
Steve Wheeler
Faculty of Education
University of Plymouth
Beyond Distance Research Alliance 1

2. Personal footprints…
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3. Personal footprints… 1975 PC 1985 CMC - Prestel 1995 Web 1.0
Information R/Evolution?
When you have watched the video
Watch Video
Select
to continue
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4. Wisdom of the crowd?
‘We no longer find information. Together we make it find us…’
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5. Beyond Distance Research Alliance5

6. What they said…
“The likes of Google, Amazon, and EBay take the intelligence of all their users…and put it in the interface”
– Tim O’Reilly
“Web 2.0 is the architecture of participation”
– Eugene Barsky 6

7. Trends in education Stable Agile Subject-based Project-based
Delivered wisdom
One size fits all
Individualised
National
One to many
Interactive
Curriculum centred
Teaching
Agile
Project-based
User generated content
Personalisation
Collaborative
Global
Peer to peer
Participative
Learner centred
Learning
(Adapted from Heppell, 2006)
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8. Categorising
The human race has an innate need to collect, classify and store.
We have a deep seated need to understand.
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9. Participants take part in activity

10. Categorising
The human race has an innate need to collect, classify and store.
We have a deep seated need to understand.
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11. Categorising =Tagging
People
Knowledge
Video
Photos
Objects
Tags (Metatagging)
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12. Wiki Wiki wiki = ‘Hurry Up’ (Hawaiian) Distributed Knowledge Building
Social Software
Group owned web pages
Edited by all users
Seen by a ‘hidden audience’
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13. The Wiki Manifesto
‘Imagine a world in which every single person is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge…..
That’s what we are doing.’
Jimmy Wales
Wikipedia
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14. What are Wikis Good for? Knowledge construction over a period of time
Progressive problem solving (particularly ill-structured and open-ended problems)
Developing ‘communities of practice’
Explanation of increasingly complex or diverse ideas
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15. What are Wikis Good for?
Critically reading and responding in a constructive (and public) way to the work of peers
Learning how to add nuance and added value to concepts, ideas and knowledge
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16. What are Wikis Good for?
Evaluation of other people’s ideas and knowledge
Learning to observe in a deeper and more critical manner
Learning to stereotype less and avoid premature judgements
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17. What are Wikis Poor at? ‘Instant’ knowledge generation
Reaching consensus
Replacing other resources
Assessment of individual work
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18. Recent Studies at Plymouth
B.Ed (Hons) Primary Teachers
Post 16 Education Teachers
Minimum core Post 16 Education
Literacy
Numeracy
Language
ICT
35 (1st study) +150 (2nd study) participants
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19. Study 1 Research Design Opportunistic sample (n=35)
1st, 2nd, 3rd year and post-grad
Data from discussion boards
Data from Wiki content
Post-experience questionnaires
Inter-rated reliability (3 researchers)
Ethical protocol
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20. What do we know so far?
Students reluctant to edit contributions of those they know.
Most prefer that their own work is not altered, but some accepted it:
“Is it that bad to have other people changing my work if it improves it?” (2nd Year male)

21. What do we know so far? Gender differences observed in responses:
“If anyone changes my page, I’ll kill them!” (1st Year male)
“I think I will cry if anyone changes my page!!!” (1st Year female)

22. What do we know so far?
Students rarely used the wiki beyond the formalised setting:
Over 90 per cent of contributions were posted during class time
Remainder were posted within 48 hours of a class

23. Tagging of key words creates
a search facility

24. What do we know so far?
Hidden ‘audience’ encourages greater care in writing:
“i have developed more consideration for others when writing, as you know that everyone will be reading what you write.” (2nd Year female)

25. What do we know so far?
Hidden ‘audience’ encourages greater care in writing:
“I have to consentrate more on my spelling, and grammar so that is makes sense for the person who is reading it.. and I have to read [it] mulitple times before posting it!” (1st Year female)

26. What do we know so far?
Use of the wiki encouraged more accurate referencing:
“...my referencing has improved through using the wiki, as it had made me realise how important it is to state where you got your information from initially.” (2nd Year female)

27. What do we know so far?
Use of the wiki encouraged greater critical awareness:
“… I am now developing a healthy critical and analytical writing style thanks to the wiki. Looking at other people’s opinions and findings has helped me to question what’s in front of me …” (2nd Year male)

28. What do we know so far? The wiki encouraged better focus for study:
“…Using the wiki has made writing much more focused on a part of a topic rather than gettin confused trying to tackle the topic as a whole -” (2nd Year female)

29. What do we know so far?
To what extent did using the wiki improve your academic writing?
“don't think it did sorry :( appart from the grammer” (2nd Year female)
“not any really i wrote like i usually wrote. i was a bit more consious of spelling so i wrote in word befor posting” (2nd Year male)

30. What do we know so far?
To what extent did using the wiki improve your academic writing? skills?
“Not at all - it was the subject matter that I learnt” (2nd Year male)
“erm i dont think it did :-S perhaps i might have subconciously been writing to the audience?” (2nd Year female)

31. What do we know so far?
To what extent did you use the wiki after you completed the module  to help you to write your assignment? “
“i didnt think i would use it at all but i actually found it very useful for the assignment. the information inputted by other people i found quite useful and it helped me make sense of the essay title.” (2nd Year male)

32. What do we know so far?
To what extent did you use the wiki after you completed the module  to help you to write your assignment? “
“Not at all - I didn't think if I quoted from the WIKI it would be deemed as a valid source.” (2nd Year male)

33. Wiki activities Introduce yourself (+ choose an image)
Discuss and agree on ‘wikiquette’
Find ‘Gold Dust’ resources and post
Say why is it useful to you
Comment on someone else’s post
Produce ‘key’ messages/key words
Compare and contrast two articles
Precis of 100 words
DW wiki
WLH wiki
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34. What do we know so far? Students enjoy using wikis
Quantity vs quality can be an issue
Critiquing others’ work feels threatening for some
Some students do not engage
New for many, so learning about possibilities (rules?) is needed
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35. What do we know so far?
Students take more care with composition, spelling & grammar on the wiki pages (hidden audience effect -tags)
Much more informal on discussion board
Most work (90%) done in classroom
Needed better scaffolding through structured activities
Results
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36. Study 2 Research Design Opportunistic sample (n=80)
1st, 2nd year and post-grad students
Data from discussion boards
Data from Wiki content
Post-experience questionnaires
Inter-rated reliability (3 researchers)
Ethical protocol
Focus on structured wiki activities
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37. Questions Which activities did you find the most useful? Why was this?
Which activities did you find the least useful?
To what extent did the Wiki help you to work with others?
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38. Questions
What barriers did you needed to overcome when using the wiki?
Do you think using the wiki enhanced your learning experience?
If so, in what ways?
Could the wiki activities have been done any other way? How?
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39. Future Research at UoP Blog Wikis (Blikis) Voice Wikis (V-Wikis)
Development
Testing
Evaluation
Convergence with Podcasting
Use in schools (literacies)
Wiki ++
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40. Thank You. Any questions?E:
W: www2.plymouth.ac.uk/distancelearning B: 25