Question: How many Wiki people does it take to change a lightbulb?
Answer: One, but anyone can change it back.
Wikis are one of several web-based applications that are changing the Internet from a distribution network to a communications and collaboration platform. Wikis allow, encourage, and often even depend on collaboration. Wikis are also free and easy to use and edit. What opportunities do wikis, with their collaborative and accessible nature, bring to learning environments? Can wikis be used to more actively engage students in creating and controlling their learning? Can assignments be submitted and distributed using wikis? Can an entire class collaborate on a single assignment, changing the nature and scale of assignments? Do wikis alter relationships amoung students and between teachers and students?
This session will begin with a description of the lessons learned when using a wiki to enable third-year Computer Science students to collectively author a wiki-based textbook for first-year Computer Science students. Then, the seminar will explore various strategies for effectively incorporating wikis into learning environments.
About the speaker: Christina Penner
Christina Penner teaches technical communication in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Manitoba. She is committed to giving her students assignments that address real-life needs and is delighted when new technologies, such as wikis, allow more students to work together to solve larger problems. Her students have written user manuals for customized software used in Winnipeg high-schools, authored a text-book for first-year computer science students, and are working on a "for students by students" guide to using the university libraries.
Christina has a MA in literature and is interested in the politics of writing with technology and the blurry boundaries between creative and technical writing.
About the speaker: Peter Tittenberger
Peter Tittenberger has been the Director of the Learning Technologies Centre at the University of Manitoba since its formation in 2005. Peter has also worked in University Teaching Services and the Information Services and Technology units at the UM. Previously, Peter worked in the Media Department at the University of Winnipeg for 20 years.A graduate of the University of Manitoba, he holds a Post Graduate Certificate in Distributed Learning from the University of British Columbia and is an unrecovering wikiholic.
