Engaging learners through Collaboration
Engaging and enabling people to work in a collaborative way can be facilitated by using a number of different technologies. This resource introduces two such tools, blogs and wikis. These are both known as 'Web 2.0' tools, which means that they encourage online collaboration and sharing of information.
A Wiki is a web page that can be edited by a number of people. One of the best known wikis is Wikipedia, a user-generated encyclopedia. A wiki can be really useful for creating collaborative documents or reports, for undertaking collaborative projects or for creating a shared web space. You could create a 'Frequently Asked Questions' wiki, where anyone could ask a question or provide the answer to a question.
A blog is an online diary or journal. Blogs are a useful way for learners to capture their reflective thoughts. Blogs also allows others to comment on entries, which means that they can be a useful way of providing peer support.
To access the resource, select the resource using the link below, which will open in a new window. The resource contains lots of links to information about blogs and wikis, and you should spend some time exploring these links. You may also be interested to note that the resource itself is a wiki.
The resource consists of a series of web pages. The size of the font and the background colour can be changed by anyone who edits the wiki.
Educause Learning Initiative has produced a series of pdf documents called 7 Things You Should Know about ..... These documents include information about wikis, blogs and microblogging. One of the best known microblogging tools is Twitter, which allows someone to post a short message to anyone who has signed up to follow them. The message is usually a status update - what the person is doing or thinking. A number of famous people tweet (the term for posting a Twitter message), including Barack Obama and Stephen Fry.
Common Craft produce a series of videos which explain a wide range of technology tools, including blogs and wikis. These videos could be used to help explain terms to colleagues or learners. The videos are available in a number of languages.
