Reflection on Wiki
Throughout our second week of learning engagements, we had to contribute our thoughts and research findings to a group Wiki. This Wiki was dedicated to mobile phones and their implications on learning both positive and negative, in a classroom situation. Participant’s thinking and perspectives were guided by the de Bono's Six Thinking Hats structure. Consequently, by using this digital pedagogy a greater understanding of the topic at hand was gained and it cued responses to be specific. This in turn allowed the discussion to have ‘depth’ as a large range of perceptions were voiced.
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| Source: Working Together |
So let’s deconstruct the learning experience that each of the members experienced shall we? Interestingly, many people could argue that there was more than one learning theory in which was involved in aiding the participants to learn. This is due to the fact that each learning theory can have a tendency to ‘overlap’. Nonetheless, I believe that the dominant learning theory that was implemented in the Wiki activity was social constructivism. This was obvious to the learner by the essential ‘social’ and collaborative interaction component of the task. Additionally, the structure of the activity showed deliberate 'scaffolding' or learning activities by the course coordinator so that we as learners could answer the specific questions in which allowed us as participants, to create and facilitate our learning experience. The application of the Six Thinking Hats scaffold, was helpful as it allowed participants to answer a broad range of specific questions which introduced a discussion about many aspects of the mobile phone issue. Therefore, participants were not able to just reflect on their own feelings about the topic or creativity elements but were encouraged to discuss all aspects of the issue. Consequently, multiple perspectives about whether mobile phone should be implemented were produced.
It was beneficial to complete this group activity, as research facts were presented in addition to participant’s personal beliefs and knowledge of the topic. Due to personal experiences and perceptions being shared among the group, each individual was able to contribute to the learning of others. As Vygotsky (2013) states, ‘full cognitive development' and deeper knowledge is 'prolonged through social interaction’.
· Group work on an assignment
Wiki’s can be utilised in a Primary setting with the following activities:
· Collaborative vocabulary lists, glossaries or a class encyclopedia
· Collating research for assignment tasks or to do with the current unit of work
· Digital portfolio for students
· Allow a peers to review others work therefore creating feedback
References:
Vygotsky, L. (2013). Social Development Theory, March 5. Retrieved from
Working20Together[Image]. (2008) Retrieved from http://cngroup.wordpress.com/2008/07/09/social-constructionism/
Thanks Monique
ReplyDeleteReferencing looks good. Who would you use a wiki tool with and can you envisage a learning activity that would suit this tool?
A Wiki can be utilised as a tool to enhance learning in many ways. For example, a year six class may be focusing on plants throughout their science (biology) learning area. The teacher could incorporate a wiki activity into their learning plan to encourage a collaborative and engaging learning experience. The activity should be carefully structured so that students could concentrate on a specific topic such as the ‘structure and function’ of plants that they have seen or have been learning about in class. A comparing and contrasting matrix could be set up by the teacher in order for the students to fill out. Selected students (last names starting with A-M) could contribute to the similarities of each set plant and all the others (N – Z) could fill out all of the differences. From this activity the students could than write a summary of plants using descriptive and comparative language.
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