Presentation on wikis for the M25 Learning Technology Group, looking at epistemologies and group work behaviour and considering implications for wiki task design and assessment.
5. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Wikis: legitimate learning institutions
“…a collaborative, knowledge-making
impulse in humans who are willing to
contribute, correct, and collect information
without remuneration: by definition, this is
education. To miss how much such
collaborative, participatory learning
underscores the foundations of learning is
defeatist, unimaginative, even self-
destructive.”
(Davidson and Goldberg 2009)
6. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Wikis: real-world
“…the user-centred focus of Web 2.0
activities supports the learner in
transgressing and resituating content and
practices between the formal and informal
learning settings in which s/he participates.”
(Dohn, 2009)
7. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Wikis: real-world
“... amplify the students’ sense that there
may be multiple interpretations of the same
topic of study or discussion point ... It also
underlines the fact that interpretations may
converge or diverge, highlighting the natural
complexity of interrelations within the realms
of knowledge.”
(Trentin, 2008)
9. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Great Expectations, JISC IPSOS MORI, 2008
Familiar
Unfamiliar
ComfortableNot comfortable
Instant messaging
Text message
admin updates
Administrative
materials online
Using existing online social
networks to discuss coursework
Emailing tutors
Course-specific
materials online
Posting questions
Online to tutors
Web CT
Using social networks
such as Facebook as
a formal part of the
course
Submitting
assignments
online
Using podcasts
Making podcasts
Making wikis
12. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Desirable beliefs about knowledge
Knowledge as complex, tentative, derived
by reason, acquired gradually, and related
to persistence and hard work.
Teaching can make a difference.
15. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Group work behaviour
• ‘Social loafing’
– Less individual effort compared to lone work
– Infectious
• ‘Diligent isolate’ depends on self alone to
get the job done
– Compounds any loafing
• However, smaller groups
– Can easily meet offline
– May lack critical mass or creative friction
16. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Cooperation is not collaboration
• Where learning is viewed as acquisition,
peer editing isn’t viewed as constructive:
– Multi-centred, individualistic contributions
– Adding rather than editing – let alone deleting
– Bargaining
“I think I will cry if anyone
changes my page!!!”
(Wheeler et al, 2008)
21. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Scaffolding, rules, constraints
• Help keeping abreast of developments
• Prefab or templated pages to edit
• Taxonomy for tagging
– e.g. only link designated words (boundaries)
• Set of peer questioning stems
• Division of labour (equal opps; control)
• Things you can count (words per page,
minimum number of entries)
22. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Assessment - giving credit
• Negotiating assessment criteria
– More than demonstrating a knowledge object
– Interdependence
• Multiple assessment points (stops free-riding)
• ‘Procedural justice’ (metrics)
• ‘Distributive justice’ (recognition)
• Peer, group, and individual marks
– For the overall process
– For each student’s role in the process
– For the end product
23. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
References / bibliography
• Davidson, C. & Goldberg, D., 2009. The future of learning institutions in a digital age. Available at:
http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/chapters/Future_of_Learning.pdf.
• Dohn, N.B., 2009. Web 2.0: Inherent tensions and evident challenges for education. International Journal of
Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning, 4(3), pp.343-363.
• JISC Ipsos MORI (2008) Great expectations of ICT: How Higher Education institutions are measuring up.
Available from: http://www.jisc.ac.uk/publications/documents/greatexpectations.aspx
• Karasavvidis, I., 2010. Wiki uses in higher education: exploring barriers to successful implementation. Interactive
Learning Environments, 18(3), pp.219-231.
• Larusson, J.A. & Alterman, R., 2009. Wikis to support the “collaborative” part of collaborative learning.
International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning, 4(4), pp.371-402.
• Piezon, S.L.,& Donaldson, R.L. (2005). Online groups and social loafing:Understanding student-group
interactions.Online Journal ofDistance Learning Administration, 8(4). Retrieved from:
http://www.westga.edu/*distance/ojdla/winter84/piezon84.htm
• Schommer, M. (1990) Effects of beliefs about the nature of knowledge on comprehension, Journal
• of Educational Psychology, 82, 498-504.
• Stahl, G. & Hesse, F., 2009. Paradigms of shared knowledge. International Journal of Computer-Supported
Collaborative Learning, 4(4), pp.365-369.
• Trentin, G., 2008. Using a wiki to evaluate individual contribution to a collaborative learning project. Journal of
Computer Assisted Learning, 25(1), pp.43-55.
• Wheeler, S., Yeomans, P., & Wheeler, D. (2008). The good, the bad and the wiki: Evaluating student-generated
content for collaborative learning. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(6), 987–995.
24. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Scenario
A colleague from Psychology approaches
you. He wants his cohort of 20 MSc
students to co-write reviews of the course’s
weekly visiting presenter series.
He says these will be assessed, but he
hasn’t yet decided how.
He asks only for a guide to using the VLE’s
wiki tool that he can circulate to students.
How do you respond?
25. M25LTG, 29 Nov
2010
Issues to resolve with wikis
• Group task needs to be
integrated
• Uneven or low
participation
• Free-riding
• Competition for popular
content
• Students skeptical about
value of own knowledge
• Complexity of editing
• Trepidation about editing
peers’ work
• Bargaining for credit
• Resistance to being
edited
• Need for sustained
attention / awareness
• Need for good
communication
• Plagiarism
• Demands of software
• Gaming the assessment
• Resent being assessed
as group
Hinweis der Redaktion
What it takes for wiki to work.
about the nature of knowledge and the process of knowing
Direct attention new recognitions of the education
Banning students from using wikipedia
There are two axes here – one is a measure of comfort with particular technology to support learning and on the other is the degree of familiarity with the technology.
As an example you see top right hand corner, instant messaging – comfortable using it for learning and familiar with the technology.
Down here we have the Virtual Learning Environment Web CT…
The interesting point is that they are familiar with using social networks such as Facebook, but not comfortable using them as part of their learning.
Look at the bottom left quadrant. Learners aren’t comfortable with using newer technologies or established technologies in new ways, in their learning.
There’s a perceived split between learning lives and social lives.
Shaped by the educational tasks students are given.
Funnel metaphor – transmitted, acquired, having rather than being.
Desirable views of higher learning:
complex
requiring the integration of ideas
requiring task persistence.
it creates tensions regarding ownership, authorship, and requirements of
individual contributions of comparative quantity and quality.
Shared mental representations may not necessarily challenge simple epistemologies because they are about transferring and comparing, rather than challenging and changing per se.
