Loving Wikis

Although I am new to blogs, I started using wikis earlier this year. A teacher in my department has been using them for years and has even shown us how to set one up. Despite this, I hadn't used them. However, this year, that teacher and I were assigned to teach the same class so I finally got onboard with wikis. We use one wiki for both our classes, but we are both administrators for the wiki. During the first week of school we also set up our students with wikis. Since it's an English class, they created electronic writing folders. Some of them already had one from when they had the other teacher in ninth grade, so they just made a new page for 11th grade. The students copy/pasted the NC product list for 11th grade into their wiki, and they are uploading the products as we work through the year. We are also using the wiki discussion feature. We have done individual class discussions and joint discussions. The joint discussions are pretty cool because it's been a way for our students to collaborate without us being in the same classroom. The wikis are also great because it has a link to everything the student or parent could possibly want to know. If they miss a class they have no excuse for not staying caught up on their work. After using this wiki for a few weeks, I even developed one for another class I teach. Now that I have used them, I love them!