Reflections

11/24/09 Karen Stewart The wiki is a great place for collaborative work. Being able to look at the work of others, use the work as-is or adjust it according to individual needs, and discuss it with others are all great attributes of the wiki. Learning from and getting ideas from others is always a plus. If a group is really sold on the idea of a wiki and reads and contributes to it, it can be a great tool.

11/22/09 Vickie Goff Well, I think I will better understand our school's PTO wiki,now. I have been trying to work with it since school started. I just like clear instructions that I can read when trying something like this. It is very frustrating to follow instructions when everyone assumes you know what they know, and to say it is easy discounts learning styles.

11/22/09 Donna Reagan Sharing and collaboration are the two words that come to mind when thinking about a library Wiki. I like the information sharing most of all. It is very much like sharing through my Yahoo groups and it works especially well when people do share their knowledge and are able to work together to accomplish a project. The Wiki space for a school library would be a wonderful way to keep in touch with students about technology skills and other library class projects. Using the Wiki for library news is a given. The librarian in the Cold Springs Elementary School (California) has her library skills reference work classes post to a Wiki, making it a fun and effective way for kids to show their work. Using a Wiki to share stories and book talks in the library setting would be helpful. We do some of this through a sharing notebook at NPL, but having a Wiki would make this so much more efficient and eliminate the paperwork. I've enjoyed seeing the lesson plan ideas that others from each of the classes have posted. Each one is unique and opens up a whole other way of seeing and presenting a lesson; the Wiki allows this expression of self within the parameters of the assignment. A great writer once said, "to read me is to know me." When we read the plans, the processes and the thoughts of others, we do, truly, come to know them.

11/22/09 Jennifer Raines This is my first experience with using/contributing to a wiki. In reflection of my Needs Assessment and Lesson Plan on Classroom web pages, I very well could have directed teachers more towards the use of a classroom wiki. I am not sold on them completely, though. I think it would be great in a professional setting, with librarians sharing information and ideas and for use in collaboration with teachers but I am not 100% comfortable with students being free to contribute unless there is an "approval" step to keep the wiki from being misused. I am curious, though, and I like Heather's idea of teachers sharing lesson plans and then others can add their adaptations. I hope that I will have more time and opportunity to explore the use of a wiki when I have my own library.

11/22/09 Rhonda Harris I like the idea of a wiki for so many purposes: book clubs, on going research, tutorials, assessment tools, parent consultation and much more. I like the fact that it is so interactive. I'm new to it and although this is my first exposure I think it's very "do-able" and feels less intimidating than a web page. It's more realistic for my time and abilites right now. The work has already been done and all I have to do is make changes. It's a great tool and plan to make it a part on my ongoing collaborative efforts.

11/22/09- Rania Michael This is my first time to use the Wiki. I think Wiki encourage collaborative learning and information sharing and could facilitate communication between librarians, faculty and students.Also it is easy to use, edit information and store many inforamtion

11/22/09 Heather Karazin Wikis are a great interactive workspace for a class or for a library. One way to use this would be for teachers to be able to post lesson plans and then teachers can add modifications and adaptations that they incorporated into the lesson plan when they taught it to their class. You could use a wiki with an English class. The teacher could post a story base and then every could go in and add to it and change grammatical errors until there was a final product upon which everyone is graded. Being able to add widgets such as calendars really add to the value of a wiki, a librarian could use a wiki as their main webpage for their library. I hope to be able to be able to further explore the use of wiki's when I am a librarian.

11/22/09 Olivia Matthews I started playing around with wikis this past summer and come to really like them. I have started several wikis for different reasons. One wiki was for the 5th grade class I was teaching at the beginning of this year. I plannned on using it as a class webpage, where I posted a calendar with assignments and projects, classroom goals, the happenings in the class, and etc. If I had more time, I intended to have students submit work on the wiki such as book talks and various types of reports. I have also used this wiki to create a library webpage for a local high school. That was a lot of fun.... I was able to really get into the wiki and play with the settings a learn a bunch more.

One advantage for using a wiki instead of a webpage, is that you can get students, teachers, parents, and faculty members involved and have them contribute to the wiki very easily. It is a very collaborative tool that can be used for so many different types of things.

11/21/09 Audree Keele I haven't had much experience with wikis either, but I can see the potential for its usefulness in the library setting. I think a key part would be marketing it, just like we talked about marketing reference services today. Having the wiki doesn't do much good unless everyone knows about it and uses it (just ask Olivia re: our class wiki!).

11/21/09 Anita Fentress This would be an effective tool to use with the faculty. The librarian could set up a wiki where the faculty could share questions or requests. The teachers could respond to each other, and the librarian could answer questions when necessary. In addition, this would be a place for teachers to share information and documents needed for grade level projects. A calendar would also be helpful for teachers to keep up with upcoming library events. This is a great forum for collaboration. I have not had experience using wikis, but I can see many uses for them both in the classroom and in the library. As Stella commented, the time involved it getting it set up would be a consideration.

11/21/09 - Beverly Bullock I used wikis a couple of times as an academic coach when several of us were working on a partner project. It was so handy to be able to work on a document together but not have to physically //be// together. I think wikis have great potential in the school setting. The librarian could create wiki book talks to give students a communal spot to comment about a particular book. Wikis could also be an effective way for students to collaborate on a group project. Another possibility would be for the librarian to use a wiki as a collaboration tool with a teacher or group of teachers. After attending the grade level meeting, the librarian could start the wiki on a specific topic for the group to work on together. B-)

11/18/09 - Stacey Vandrasik Having a wiki for your library would be great for so many reasons. In addition to sharing lesson plans and ideas, which the librarian will see and hopefully supplement with great books and technology, you can also use this as an area to request books you would like purchased for the library. It is your connection to all the grade level needs and curriculum. It provides a venue for you to touch base with the needs of the school.

11/18/09 - Stella White I went to a class provided by the technology experts of the famous Metropolitan Nashville Public School system. It was a joy to learn how to use the free wiki, however, since the class I have had NO time to develop it. What I intend to do with my wiki is to have my calendar, useful sites, handouts, and other type information posted to it. We have so few students who have been given permission to participate in any interactive communication technology that I do not see a use for our students in the near future. However, a high school teacher could find this extremely useful by posting an article, question, or any other such posting and have students discuss what they have read or share their views.