Stewart Mader and John Willinsky gave a talk on wikis and communities. Several bloggers took notes:
Wikis in education:
His classes have created an on-going repository of lesson plans for K-12 teachers using this wiki -a brilliantly conceived framework for the knowledge management that a well-organized wiki is so good at. Moreover, the community is centered around building professional and personal resource for thinking, learning, and teaching.
Wikis versus print publishing:
traditional vs wiki publishing. Not trying to slam trad publishing. Anyone adjusting to the realities of the web and the online world. The publishing industry is as well. Tough for an industry with an old structure that has worked well for a long time. Tough thing to be asked to publish a book that will also be on a wiki, editable, not necc. Have to have paid for the book, not proprietary. It is a loss of control for them. To work, there has to be a community around it and there cannot be barriers to participation.
More on wikis in education:
Raising a generation of “rip, burn, download� with no concept of Intellectual Property. We need to have educators think about it as “go public�. They bring materials into the classroom (through the Wiki) that would otherwise never apply — a sharing of IP. Wiki becomes a cumlative index — class ended in December, but the students are continuing to work and add value
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