For this assignment, you will help create a wikipedia (not THE Wikipedia, but A wikipedia!) that will become a permanent resource describing educational technologies and best practices for utilizing these technologies in teaching. In true Web 2.0 fashion, we will hopefully be collaborating with students from the University of Georgia on creating this wiki, as well as future students. Hopefully, you will return to this wiki in the future to find new ideas for integrating technology effectively, because eash semester the information available on the wiki will grow.
Procedures
1. Learn about what wikis are, if you are not familiar. You can check out CommonCraft’s Wikis in Plain English explanation, or search on the Internet. You can also watch the screencasts I created below about how to use Wikispaces. However, it’s very simple, and you can probably figure most of it without watching the screencasts.
2. This wiki assignment should come after you have completed the Personal Technology Project. Click here for information about this assignment. For that final project, you will create something using a technology you are not familiar with, but which you suspect will be useful for your specific teaching situation. This wiki assignment will be the final “presentation” step of that project.
3. Create a page for the lesson plan on the Wikispaces Wiki in the appropriate place. For example, if you did a Language Arts lesson idea, click on Language Arts in the left sidebar, then “High School ELA lesson ideas.” You will see a list of possible technologies for your subject area. If the technology you chose is already there, click on the link, and then add your lesson idea on the next page by clicking the “edit” button. If your technology was not already listed on the ELA list, then add your technology, click on the link button, and create a new page for your lesson idea. Others who follow will add other lesson ideas above yours. The screencast below shows how to do this.
4. Contribute the most useful blog resource that you have gotten ideas from over the course of this semester (these are the BLOGS you subscribed to in your Google Reader–they can’t be just regular websites). Add these to the list for your subject area.
4. Proofread your work and revise your writing. Remember, this is being published for millions of potential readers! Put forth your best effort. Add any images or files that help explain your lesson idea.
5. On your blog, consider reflecting about how you might use wikis in your own teaching.
Evaluation Rubric
This assignment is worth 10 points.
- Correctly added a lesson idea with supporting materials (an example of the student-created projects, for instance) to the wiki with all links working correctly = 5 points
- Correctly added the most useful blog, website, or PLN person where you have found useful ideas this semester = 3 points
- Material presented clearly, without grammar or spelling errors, and in a professional-looking manner = 4 points
Screencasts
Advanced use of Wikispaces
Tutorial about WHERE to upload your lesson plans
FAQs
1. What are the common mistakes done on this assignment?
Glad you asked! 
. Students often forget to post the links on their blogs. These links need to be to the WIKI PAGES you created, not to the actual resources or lesson plans themselves (if they exist somewhere outside of the wiki). They also struggle with sharing the blog resource correctly. It needs to be a blog that you followed this semester and found useful. You need to be able to explain in a sentence why it was useful. It can’t be just a regular website (without an RSS feed). If you don’t remember what this is, review the PLN assignment. Also, this resource needs to be in its correct place, not at the bottom of the lesson plan page you created. So remember that for each subject area, there are two links: one leads to the lesson plans, and the other leads to blog resources. Make sure to put both in their right place. (see the screenshot).
