Week 2 ICTs: Engagement Activity 4 Blog reflection

By participating in Week 2's mobile phone wiki activity, I learnt how to participate in wikispaces, how wikispaces work and came away with a wealth of perspectives on the use of mobile phones in classrooms (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  I had never previously used a wikispace so it did take me time to work out what was required of me in a wikispace (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  The benefits of participating in a wiki like this was that there were lots of fresh ideas, opinions and further points of interest (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  It promoted collaboration and developing connections between students, group identity, inclusivity, social support and group knowledge integration through learning from one another (CQUniversity Australia, 2012). The wiki was presented in a non-threatening way, for example, if a student was shy they may be more at ease expressing themselves in this form (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  By reading the students opinions and information on a wiki, the teacher or lecturer in this case would be able to generally determine if the student had grasped an understanding of the content (CQUniversity Australia, 2012). 

The issues related to using this wiki were more related to looking at a wiki for the first time, as I had difficulty understanding what was required of us initially (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  However, upon rereading the instructions carefully, and exploring the wiki site, this became clearer (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  The drawbacks were that it was hard to know who should take the role of leader, and whether people would be offended if some of their information was cut out as someone else had also covered this idea (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  There was lots of information to read as there were so many participants  (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  The wikispace activity did become difficult to follow in the end as people ran out of room to type, or accidently typed in alternative groups and deleted others input (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).

This wiki forum is reflective of Connectivism and Social Constructivism learning theories (CQUninversity Australia, 2012).  It aligns with Connectivism learning theory as this method facilitates learning through the use of the internet and computers (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  Social Constructivism learning theory is utilised as this is the process of developing learning and understanding via social interactions and with the wider community (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).   This wiki was on the internet, required the use of a computer, and facilitated group interaction between multiple students all over Queensland and New South Wales (CQUniversity Australia, 2013).  This activity did utilise the Cognitive learning theory to a degree as it required us to demonstrate our understanding through this reflective blog which required us to break the activity into components and make sense of it by linking it to the learning theories (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  Behaviourism was also used to a degree as this learning theory involved the option of practicing the online quizzes (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).

It meets the requirements of the productive pedagogy by promoting inclusivity, group identity, academic engagement, social support, student direction, substantive conversation, knowledge integration, connectedness to the world and background knowledge (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  It also covered problem-based curriculum and the 'knowledge is problematic' areas of productive pedagogy (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  This will lead to more effective teaching and learning (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  

The scaffold of this wiki included instructions of what to do in the wiki within the confines of the de Bono's six thinking hats thinking routine (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  The scaffold promoted the collection of a range of perspectives by offering multiple options, for example, the option of choosing to provide your perspective in one of six colours of de Bono’s thinking hats that you could relate to most (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  The instructions in relation to the topic were simple and to the point so we had a clear understanding of what we required of us once we found the group section we were to participate in (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  It also provided background knowledge with links to develop an understanding of de Bono's six thinking hats as each colour represented a different perspective (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  

In the right context, wikis do have the potential to deliver high quality learning experiences to students by allowing them to develop a personal understanding of a topic through interacting with others (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  In the future, as a primary teacher I would like to develop a wikispace on the current topic in the class to encourage participation, sharing of information and ideas between the class, within the year level and even involving other schools studying the same topic (CQUniversity Australia, 2012). Links, photographs and resources could be posted to this wikispace (CQUniversity Australia, 2012). Students could add comments and information as an activity during class, and as part of homework (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).  This activity has reinforced the importance of providing an effective scaffold and pedagogy when utilising a wiki including extensive instructions and close monitoring to optimise learning outcomes from a wiki as opposed to it becoming difficult to follow and disorganised (CQUniversity Australia, 2012).

References:

CQUniversity Australia. (2012). EDED20491-ICTs for learning
             design: online studyguide. Rockhampton, Qld: Author.
             Retrieved from      
             http://moodle.cqu.edu.au/mod/page/view.php?id=115235