Class wiki is taking off!

Wow -- My fifth-graders, at least some of them, are apparently more Internet-savvy than I had realized. They LOVE the wiki (or at least, the ones who are being the most vocal, right now, love it). Some kids are logging on right away to do assignments that aren't due for a couple of days -- always a good sign! And, they're figuring out (or maybe someone at home is showing them) ways to to things that I haven't taught them. For example, I asked the kids to try out five games of their choice on Johnnie's Math Page, and then to either write a review of one of the games or post a comment on which of the "engaging leads" (posted by their classmates on one of our English Language Arts pages) most makes them most want to read the associated book. On the page for reviewing math games, the first kid to post included links to the games he was describing, and the second kid included the actual picure icon of the game as her link!

The students are already devloping their/our own "norms" for posting on our wiki, by a sort of group osmosis process. When I asked them to comment on each others' posted leads, many students wrote their comments in color (also not something I had shown them). It works so well to distinguish the leads from the comments, that I changed the rest of the comments to colored text and wrote a post suggesting that we all adopt that idea for the wiki. (The colors also add interest to the page.) It's really cool that that idea came originally from the students, just following each others' example!

Here's the link to the kids' leads and comments on them:
http://dkinneyclass09-10.wikispaces.com/Engaging+Leads

So far, I am steering clear of inviting the kids to post on anything that might get them mad at each other. For example, I thought about having them post reflections on the process of writing their myths in small groups, but then decided that that would just be inviting hurt feelings since some of the groups did have to work through some conflicts, and there might still be some lingering resentment in some cases. (Did I already mention this part in an earlier post?)

Anyway, I'm thrilled with how this is going, so far! The kids who are posting comments to each others' leads are obviously reading each other's leads, and in evaluating which they like best I know they're really thinking about them. The kids who are posting math game reviews are evaluating what makes a good learning game for them -- it's great that they're thinking actively about whether or not they're necessarily learning anything from some of the "fun" games.

Yay, wiki!