Reading Beach et al.'s descriptions of how to use Wikis in the classroom immediately brought me back to my first experience using a Wiki. That experience was here in English 504--Fall of 2008. (It's hard to believe I've already been here for two years.) The students signed onto a Wiki to try to develop a collaborative writing assignment regarding the writing that we could give our students. I remember the assignment not going too well. All three of us in the class at the time weren't really sure what to do with a Wiki. We found the concept of editing and working with each other's texts strange. Of course, we'd all heard of Wikipedia, but we weren't very familiar with Wikis.
This situation exemplifies what McLoughlin and Lee point out as the digital divide between the "fully wired" generation and those that aren't quite so fully wired. Although I consider myself to be as tech savvy as the next person, I still wasn't fluent in the vocabulary of wikis. Although this doesn't mean wikis shouldn't be used in the classroom, it does show how challenging some instructors might find these assignments.
However, I agree with Beach et al. when they write: "Collaboration is an important skill to learn in preparation for working with others in schools and the workplace" (71). Furthermore, I also think that working collaboratively can help students "learn how to negotiate differences among opinions, ideas, and perspectives" (72). In addition, I think that collaboration in the composition classroom has at least two more distinct benefits:
- It offers lessons in problem solving. Students have to learn to negotiate the logistics of working together.
- It allows students to see the writing process transform before their eyes. When they see others re-organizing, making additions, and deleting information, they can work on transforming their own writing processes or at least feel confident in their writing process that may take several steps before a competent final draft is completed.
A few weeks ago, I decided to use technology in a collaborative assignment that I normally give using pen and paper in class. The assignment asks students to try writing in open and closed forms of prose. I give the students a topic (usually something like PUC lunches or parking that they are familiar with and that is at least relatively interesting), and I ask one large group to write an informative paragraph in open form and another an informative paragraph in closed form. This semester, I decided to use Google Docs. In the past, when I've done this activity with pen and paper, I've really only been able to teach one lesson--the difference between open and closed form prose. When I used Google Docs, I realized that I was able to stress three key concepts: the difference between open and closed form prose, the recursive nature of the writing process, and problem solving. As the students worked with the same document, I watched them try different strategies until they found one that worked for them; natural leaders emerged, and both groups formulated a system that allowed them to complete the assignment in the allotted time period. In addition, when I told the students they didn't have to write in a linear pattern, I was surprised at the different tactics that they tried. One student would make another student's introductory sentence the conclusion, etc. Finally, the students practiced the concept we had been studying--open and closed form prose.
Because of this experience with technology and collaboration, I would like to use more activities like this. I think these kind of collaboration techniques allow students to not only become familiar with and discuss a multitude of ideas, but it also allows students to practice the recursive nature of the writing process with others' work, teaching them to do it in their own work.
The ability to collaborate is, as you say, an undeniably vital skill for the next generation to have. Although working with others can be very challenging, these skills need to be practiced in the classroom before being attempted in the "real" world. It would be interesting to just let composition students loose with a topic on a wiki and see what happens.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking how interesting it would be for an entire grade level to create a wiki collaboratively. How many people could be involved in a wiki? It doesn't seem to have the limitations that writing a single document (online or otherwise) would have. Every year, teachers complain about students cheating and not completing the reading because they rely on students' experiences in earlier class periods of English class. I wonder if collaboration on a larger scale (say, 250 students with 4 teachers) would be useful to encourage students to 1) actually read the novel!! and 2) think about it.
Any thoughts?
Hi Miranda, It's cool that you design interesting projects for your class again I must give you props. My kids teachers seem to lack passion-it's ninth grade, maybe there's something about Freshman?
ReplyDeleteI also grabbed onto your emergent leader statement and just really want to state that there will be people who really shock you if placed in a role of leadership. And, held accountable!
You are my hero teacher so do your thing, but I would on occasion assign group leaders, with specific guidelines on their expected behavior. Not to just change up the dynamics of things, but also to allow some of the other students to find the inspiration within themselves to motivate others. Guess you can tell that I'm a proponent of promoting leadership, which really isn't an element in this course.
Another thing I would like to randomly add...is that I would be extremely miserable deleting (editing) someone else's words (except copy-edit). Unless I could cut them out and set them to the side. Not that their is a shortage of words, it would make me feel too responsible for the writer's feelings. And, I wouldn't like it to happen to me either. Have a Happy Monday!!!-Angela Santistevan
Hey Miranda,
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting when you note that "It allows students to see the writing process transform before their eyes." This is interesting because it is difficult to teach that sometimes. I did not see that this form of writing could be useful as meta-cognitive approach.
I did not see writing as a process until I took ENG 504. I wrote my own way and did not look at it meta-cognitively. Since then, I have become more in-tune with my own process. I just wish I could have learned it as an undergraduate.
I think the average student's experience with a wiki is different from what they get in a classroom. In a classroom, students have to create wikis from scratch, while most students probably edit or add new articles to already established wikis. So we can't even expect students familiar with wikis to have an easy time.
ReplyDelete