Knowledge Meta Skills
This is the current revision list from one of the pages on our studying societies history wiki. Lists like these are always interesting to share with kids. They don't often look at them themselves and don't realize the number of people who have edited one page. I like the compare feature that is on all pbwiki pages. It lets anyone easily view the revisions that have been made.
This is interesting, powerful, and different for kids to see. Many times, kids seem to believe that information and learning simply falls out of the air into the heads of other students who may be more successful then themselves. They often fail to see the incremental advancements in knowledge that accrue through steady, consistent efforts; this lets them see that work.
While this approach may not lead to radical breakthroughs in knowledge, it does let kids see the steady increases that are possible. It lets them see the benefits of putting their heads together and makes visible the process of knowledge building. A long with the ability to access information from anywhere at anytime, this to me is one of the major benefits of using wikis, it gives kids access to meta skills that would be very difficult understand without using this tool.
As an aside, is this the same wiki you began last year? Typically we'd start from scratch creating content and understanding. Do you see any situation where you'd have kids pick up from where a previous class left off?
Posted by: Dean Shareski | Thursday, December 21, 2006 at 08:45 PM
This is the same wiki that I started last year with my class. We left the content up from what the kids finished last year and are continuing to add new stuff to the old stuff. Last year's content serves as a starting point for this year's kids. We re - use old information in textbooks, why can we not re - use our own old content?
Posted by: Clarence Fisher | Friday, December 22, 2006 at 06:50 AM
That's the answer I figured you'd give and hoped you'd give...Merry Christmas.
Posted by: Dean Shareski | Friday, December 22, 2006 at 11:45 PM
Hello Clarence,
I recently discovered your blog via the Fischbowl--boy, do you seem fortunate do be in that community--and just want to tell you a) I linked you on my blogroll and included you in a post, b) I enjoy your writing enough to have Bloglined you, c) I'm a HS humanities (English and history) teacher in Seoul, formerly in Shanghai, also blogging about 21st c. literacy and pedagogy etc, and d) I hope we can "hive" a bit ourselves about how to use all these tools creatively and effectively. They're all emerging like a monster wave, and we're all novice surfer-adventurers.
Visit me at http://burell.blogspot.com
Keep learning and sharing~
Clay
Posted by: Clay Burell | Wednesday, January 03, 2007 at 06:08 PM