Wiki/Deki Experiment in Beginning Algebra
Earlier the semester I had one of my Algebra classes compile their notes on a deki/wiki (pjhs.wik.is). I view the students work on this as a great success even though I did not follow through after a few weeks. Now at the end of the semester the students are studying and taking their final exam. I wish I would have had the follow through to have the students’ notes for the whole semester on the wiki instead of just the first few weeks of notes.
The use of a wiki for an Mathematics class works well for student generated notes. Granted this class is a bit more motiviated overall about learning than your typical 8th grade class. This helped get having the students share their notes on the wiki.
Next school year I intend on having each of my math classes involved in compiling notes on this deki or a wiki that I have on a domain I control. The students at our school have access to an online book, so the worked-out examples are there to see. The notes I want the students to take and put on the wiki are not the worked-out examples that were shown in class or in the text but what was said/discussed in class that made those examples make sense to them. This did not always happen and is something I’ll emphasize to the students next year.
The next goal is to get the district to upgrade their web servers so we do not have to register domains outside of the district, incurring extra costs, to get the web tools we want to use.
