Exploring Wiki's

While exploring different wiki sites, I found educators using them for many purposes. Collaborative writing was common in the early elementary classes. For the older student classrooms, there was a lot more information on the sites. These sites often contained class information and student lists and their writings. Some sites were very simple and others were complex. 

I can see the benefit of using a wiki in the classroom. It can be for one project where all of the students need to collaborate or it can be broken down into small group projects. I like how you can see the changes made and if need be, the information can be changed back to an earlier time. I think knowing that everyone can see their work, students will be more careful with their research and writing skills.

I used PB Works for my wiki : http://kcsdelementaryband.pbworks.com

My biggest problem was deciding what content I wanted to put on this wiki. I decided to keep it very simple with a couple of pages of information and a question and answer page. I did not add student users. I decided to leave the students post their answer in the comment section. I am not really sure how this will work. I think this site will definitely be a trial and error type of site to see what works and what I want it to be in the end.

The way I would use this wiki in the classroom is what I have created. Since I do not have time for students to create or write on the wiki in my lesson time, I have created questions on the site for students to go into and answer. This would just be under the Communication and Collaboration part of the NETS-S. It might be interesting to create a page for students to post questions and have other students post the answers. I will have to really sit down and think on the best way I could use a wiki with my elementary band students besides just posting information like a website.