Blogs & Wikis for Educators

Dwight Woodley

Jason Heiser


What is all the fuss with wiki's and blogs? In this sessions we will explore wiki's and blogging in the classroom and how it can transform your classroom into a collaborative learning environment.


Blogging in the Classroom

Blogging has become one of the newest technology trends to integrate writing into the classroom. So what is a Blog?

Blog is a short form for the term weblog. A weblog is an online journal used to record news and opinions. A Blog allows syndication of articles in the same fashion as a newspaper. It looks like a web site but the information is organized in a series of chronological articles. Is blogging a good tool to use in the classroom?

Below are some sites that may help you decide to create a blog or better ways to use a blog.

Blogs in Plain English: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN2I1pWXjXI

Educational Blogs

http://wallworld20.blogspot.com/

http://www.teachthecivilwar.com/

http://elemenous.typepad.com/weblog/

http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/2787268

http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/teaching_with_blogs/teaching_with_blogs.cfm


Administrators:

http://mrfausnaught.blogspot.com/

http://nunknews.blogspot.com/


http://principalwoodley.blogspot.com



Wiki's in the Classroom

A wiki is a website where users can add, remove, and edit every page using a web browser. It's so terrifically easy for people to jump in and revise pages that wikis are becoming known as the tool of choice for large, multiple-participant projects.

Wikipedia says:

A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content (excluding blocked users), using a simplified markup language.[1][2] Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites and to power community websites. The collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia is one of the best-known wikis.[2] Wikis are used in business to provide intranet and knowledge management systems. Ward Cunningham, the developer of the first wiki software, WikiWikiWeb, originally described it as "the simplest online database that could possibly work".[3]

"Wiki" (/wiːkiː/) is a Hawaiian word for "fast".[4] "Wiki Wiki" is a reduplication. "Wiki" can be expanded as "What I Know Is", but this is a backronym.[5]

Wiki's in Plain English:

Check out this video on wiki's: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dnL00TdmLY