Week+4

=Week 4 - Wikis=

**//Thing 5 - What's a Wiki?//**
Wikis are communal web pages where people can add, edit, and delete information that is shared. The most famous Wiki is of course Wikepedia. It is easy to revert to a previous version of a page in case you do not like changes that were made. You can also require a login to make sure you control who adds to your Wiki if you get a lot of spam (junk information) on your Wiki. You can also determine which pages are editable and which ones are not. The available options depend on Wiki software that you are using.

Wikis are a great tool for libraries. For example, you can have students and teachers post to share their own book reviews to your library Wiki. You could also create pages where people can add cool web links for certain subject areas to share. A great example of a school library wiki is the Kearns High library wiki. The Wikispaces Best Educational Wikis for 2010 and Best Educational Wikis for 2011 are also a great place to look for ideas. For general ideas about what to put on your library Wiki (or website for that matter) check out the the post from Amelia Evans on LM-NETfor a list of school library website URLs, or simply go to her best practices wiki for examples.

For an article on using wikis in your teaching please read Wikis and Wikipedia as a Teaching Toolby Piotr Konieczny.

__Thing 5 Learning2.0 Tasks__
1. Watch this [|common craft video] about the wiki phenomenon.

2. Create your own Wiki space and go to wikispaces to sign up for free. There are more places to get free wiki space (e.g. pbworks) but wikispaces is the easiest to use. You'll be using this Wiki for your Library Wiki Assignment which comes in three parts. Wikispaces has great HELP pages (it is actually a help wiki!), even ones especially tailored to help teachers. They also have great introductory videos. You can choose among different tours to get exactly what you need.

3. Write down your username and password and wiki address (URL) in case you forget.

4. **Write a blog post (using your very own blog created during week 2!) about what you learned and think about Wikis**. Perhaps you can highlight good example wikis you aspire to!