WIKIs

WIKIs are a way of making communication both easy and manipulable for multiple users. Unlike an email, which is read like a letter and can only be responded to in a separate email; or a Blog, where you can comment immediately on someone else's work but may not be read or heeded, WIKIs are as collaborative as you like.

One user may put up a list of what needs to be brought to school for a project, and another can add to that list, or perhaps delete something off the original. As far as communication that is separated by space and time go, WIKIs provide probably the most similar experience to an authentic face-to-face conversation, excepting the phone. There is an interplay between users that is lacking on other non-live communication.

I started up a WIKI to communicate with my family scattered around Melbourne, to get their help in deciding what I will need to bring with me when I move back to Victoria later this year, or early next year. WIKIs really are simple to use and such an effective way of communicating with multiple people in different locations.

In a learning environment, WIKIs can be used in collaborative projects where learners need to interact with each other outside school hours. As well as the actual learning task being covered, students will also be working on social and technological etiquette, learning to challenge others' opinions and backing up their own and working out how to compromise with others to achieve a result satisfactory to all.

These social skills are essential if we want the learners to be successful in the world. Learning the appropriate ways of communicating and forming partnerships in a digital medium are imperative in the twenty-first century. We need to become collaborators and manipulators of information on a global scale to be ready for the Knowledge Economy.

If we teach our students computer skills without using social appropriateness as a backdrop, then we are doing them a disservice. Just about anyone now has access to a world of knowledge at the click of a button, so to stand above the crowd we need to practice and acquire skills that best aid communication, creativity and exploration of the new technologies.

Wikis are a step above Blogs, in that with Blogs you can receive and return feedback to an audience, but with WIKIs you then have to decide whether changes that made are acceptable, you have to learn to compromise between your ideas and the ideas offered you by others. WIKI is a way of practicing team unity inside and outside of the classroom and of giving respect, thoughtful consideration and evaluation of others opinions, as well as reflecting on your own with the aim of improvement and growth ever in mind.