Week 8 Report

Hey everyone,

wrapping up week 8, I’ve learned a lot about the use of Wikis and the importance of digital rights and responsibilities. The past few weeks we’ve learnt about tools in which you can collaborate with others. Wiki is a similar tool that allows you to work with other people to create a webpage. Almost everyone has been on a Wikipedia webpage, but some might not realize that anyone can edit the page and add content. Something that I did not know what that a wiki page may be set to public, protected, or private. In a public setting anyone can view and edit the pages, in protected, anyone can view the page but only approved members can edit it, and in a private setting only approved members can view or edit the pages (K12Learning20.com, 2013). This allows for some control over what content is being posted to the page.

When first learning about Wiki pages I wondered how they exactly differed from a blog. They are similar in the sense that you can share your knowledge with the public (TeachersFirst, 2013). What sets these two tools apart is that nobody else can edit your blog except you. Blogs offer a way to express your personal opinion to the masses, while Wikis you can post what you want however others can come in and change it. I think both offer a great way for individuals to share their knowledge on various topics.

I can see Wiki pages being useful in the education system. It is a great way to work with other people to develop a webpage that can be seen by such a large audience. It could teach students how to work collaboratively and edit each others work. It might be a great way to show a teacher what you have learnt over the span of a semester.  I think Wiki pages could be useful for some types of learning and collaborative projects. For me personally I do not see myself using this as much for academic purposes. For working with others on projects I would likely lean towards using Google documents.

Retrieved from: http://www.worldlawdirect.com/forum/law-wiki/5951-law-wiki.html

Lastly, we learned a lot about the digital rights and responsibilities for Internet users. Digital rights and responsibilities can be described as the requirements and freedoms extended to everyone in a digital world (Ribble, 2011). The three rules that I find to be most important are report/deal with cyberbullying, the responsibility to cite other people’s work, and the right to privacy.

To end this post I’l leave you with an article I found on my Feedly. The article asked veteran bloggers to reflect on mistakes they made in their early days. I thought this article was important to read as I’m new to this blogging world myself.

Enjoy!

References:

K12Learning20.com (2013). It's a wiki wiki world. Available at http://k12learning20.wikispaces.com/8-wiki1

Ribble, M. (2011). Digital citizenship in schools. (2nd ed.). International Society for Technology in Education

TeachersFirst. (2008-2013). Wiki Walkthrough Step-by-Step. Available at http://www.teachersfirst.com/content/wiki/