Wikis, Student Work & Diigo

I am a fan of the wiki and use Wikispaces with a variety of classes and in a variety of ways. Basically I began using it as a site where students can access the information they need on a particular topic. A place to put summaries and tasks they needed to complete. Now I am in the process of trying to take it to the next level and harness more of the wiki's potential by creating a place where students can work together to create the information that they need as well as present their own creations and digital portfolios. Somewhere to share, to pool knowledge and to discuss issues.

Currently I use wikis in different ways for different year groups.

• For Year 7 it is more like an online supplement to the textbook. One day I aim to make it the textbook. This wiki is visible to anyone but can only be edited by members.
  

• For Yr8 it is as above but in more detail and also a place to share some student work, uploaded by the teacher. As for Year 7, this wiki is visible to anyone but can only be edited by members of the wiki.
  

• For Yr9 I am trying to turn it into a reference text as well as a place for students to work together on projects, upload their own creations and learn from each other; bringing all the work we do into one central location. At the moment this wiki is a private wiki; it can only be seen or edited by members of the wiki.
  

The Year 9 'experiment' began with their ICT assessment task - to create their own wiki page on the class wiki and describe their likes, dislikes and abilities in Japanese. The ICT component of the task was simply aimed at enabling them to learn how to navigate around the wiki, edit pages and become familiar with the different features of the wiki.

The results were quite impressive. Some students created simple but effective pages using the target language, others were able to create visually impressive pages that both used the target language and embedded a variety of media to enhance it.

The next step was to provide feedback on the students' pages. This is when our Diigo class group became the tool of choice. With a Diigo Educator account, I have been able to create a class group for my Year 9 class. The class group is closed but we share bookmarks and there is a Group Forum to discuss sites and Japan related topics. This private Diigo Group could be the key to effective feedback for learning as it allows me to highlight text and add comments on web pages (including the students' wiki pages). These comments are only visible to those in the class group. Students can see the comments on their own page and on those of others in the class. They have simple but effective feedback and (if they wish) can see if others in the class are making similar mistakes.

My apologies for the quality of the screenshot here but hopefully you get the idea. I have posted a sticky note on the students work, providing them with a little feedback. The sticky note becomes visible when you are logged in to Diigo and place your cursor over the highlighted text. Students can then add to a comment to my sticky note if they need to ask a question or seek clarification. Too easy!

So, for all the teachers out there - get yourself a Diigo Educator Account.

If you're still not convinced that wikis can work for you, watch the clip below and simply substitute the word 'boogie' for 'wiki'. Enjoy!

It needs to be acknowledged that I was able to work on this unit of work and others for our language department thanks to funding provided by the Australian Government through the Languages Program.

Web 2.0 Tools that worked in 08

Recently I've been trying to reflect a little on the year that has just passed (school has now finished for the year for me) and was thinking about what worked and what didn't. So, keeping in line with the internet's fascination with lists, I thought I'd put together my list of web2.0 tools that have given me the most success in the language classroom this year.

1. Quizlet was without doubt the most successful. Boys were motivated to use it, create new lists and outdo each other in the vocab games. Students were even using it in other subjects to help learn definitions, etc. I suggested that they share this fact with their teachers.
2. Voki - again, this motivated students to create and use the language we had learnt. This also proved successful in getting others in the department inspired to use ICT in their language classroom. The languages department went a little "Voki mad" in the last weeks of school - kids loved it.
3. Wikispaces - This has been great for Year 7 & 8 students. One central place they can go to for vocab, grammar review, activities, links and a place to view each other's creations. Simple to use & can be private as well as ad free for educators.
4. My StuDIYo - Students can create their own quizzes, which can then be embedded in other pages (ie. wikispace). Good for mixing culture and language. Worked well with engaging some of the more reluctant students; in mixing culture and language they were able to make questions that matched up with their interests. I learnt a lot about French Rugby Union through this exercise.
5. Making comic strips with the students at Make Belief Comix. There are many sites to do this sort of activity and some that I aim to try out in the holidays but this one did the job well this year.

These are my top 5. Below are some sites I aim to check out during the holidays ...

• GoAnimate
• Scribd
• Glogster

What worked for you? Any other suggestions???

PS: A note on Ask500 (thanks to Lucy Barrow for the tip)

As I was going over programmes for next year & considering the "old ways" and possible "new ways" of doing things, it occurred to me that we often use little surveys in the language class. "What's your favourite food?", etc. So, as an experiment, I went to the survey site Ask500 to type in my question.

• Firstly, very happy that it accepted the Japanese script!

• Secondly, even happier when I went back a few hours later to see that I had about 35 responses to my "好きなかもくはなんですか" (What's your favoutite subject?) question.

• Even had a comment!

Now, if I was impressed by the world's response to my little question, I guess the students would also be happy. They could then report back to the class in the target language, summarising the responses received. "The favourite subject for .. people was ..." OR "...% like history"

The ability to comment on questions is both a positive and a potential negative. Some of the discussions in the comment are interesting and could be well worth discussing in some classrooms. Unhelpful or inappropriate comments can be "downvoted", meaning that (if enough people subtract points from the comment) the comment will disappear from the default view. Here's mine here ...