Home Stretch- Thing 21

Wikis.
To tell the truth, I didn't find any wikis for the classroom that really inspired me. Some of it just looked like so much work and I was wondering how it is all managed. How are the students trained on the wiki? Do all students have access? When do they do this? Does it take from classtime? I have SO many questions about it.

Here are a few hurdles for me in designing my own class wiki:
-Student privacy. I have to be careful to make sure no last names are posted and no pictures are posted if a child does not have permission. I also have to make sure students have permission to publish things on the web. Doing all of this will just take a little bit of time near the end of September. If I do have any students unable to do things, I would have to figure out alternatives.
-Time. The end of all things creative. I just do not see myself taking time out of instruction to go over how to use a wiki. Perhaps this 1st year I will get a few students in each class to play around with it and post things about their class.
Figuring in how to update it each week is a big time issue. It should be incorporated into the week. This will be something I will have to plan.
-My district. They are picky about "outside" websites and will not support me if something were to come of it. I have had my own website for years without issue; but it has always been in the back of my mind. To me, the positives outweigh the negatives. I have had so many positive comments from parents about the website and updates.

There are a few hurdles to jump. I am not going to bite off more than I can chew this 1st year. I would like to see how the blog and wiki can work together. Right now I have my classroom blog connected to my wiki and vice versa. I will update the blog; I will have students update the wiki. With the wiki, I can upload documents which will be helpful.

Last year I had an email list of parents. I would then send out a weekly email to all of them at the same time. I guess this year, I will have the blog with the same information- and it will be up to them to look at it. They could probably do an RSS feed to their email if they wanted to.

I am all for moving on and trying new things. I am excited about this. It is worth the time and effort- provided I do not overload myself the 1st year!

http://room214science.wikispaces.com/
http://wehnerscience.blogspot.com/