Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Wikis

The Wiki activity I did today with my students was a reflection of their Winter Breaks. They could choose to either write about their winter break in general or one of their favorite gifts. I told them that this would be their first graded assignment. On my home page, I put the rubric that I will use to grade their papers. Here are the screen shots of my home page and two of the student pages:


The rubric is very simple and it is in the same format that we use for typical writing assignments in Third Grade. Before the students wrote, I explained the rubric and how they would be graded. I wanted to make sure that everything was clear before they began their first graded assignment. All of the students did not finish, so we will be going back to the lab on Thursday to finish up. The students who have already finished will be given a partner. Each pair will read each other's writing and help them edit anything that needs to be fixed and add more details. That way, the assignment is more like a full writing project with a rough draft, editing and revising phase, and a final copy, which will just be going back and fixing what their partner told them to fix.

This is the beginnings of me trying to have my students collaborate together on a Wiki assignment. My goal for the future is to have students creating entire assigments together. I have also continued to be in contact with our Media Specialist to create cross-curricular assignments that they can work on both with me and in Media. I think that would be a great way to integrate our classes and show the students that their teachers work together just like we ask them to work together!