The World of Wikis at UW-Green Bay

It’s Group Work 2.0 on the UW-Green Bay campus. Professors are starting to use wiki technology to allow students to collaborate on projects without necessarily having to schedule time together as a group.

“I’m teaching a large Intro to Public Policy class here at UW-Green Bay and we’re using wikis to add interest to their learning,” Prof. Lora Warner said. “They’re (students are) still learning the same content and they’re doing the same kinds of projects—studying a public policy issue— but I have found they get more interested, they get more enthusiastic and a lot more learning takes place when they’re using technology such as a wiki.”

A wiki is a web page or collection of web pages that can be viewed and collaboratively edited by any number of people at once or over time. Wikis allow users to share ideas simultaneously on a given topic.

It’s starting to catch on to the increasingly tech-savvy generation of students. Faculty members expect to use wikis in the classroom more often as the technology develops.

See how this Web 2.0 technology is being put to use to promote interactive learning at UW-Green Bay.

Video Transcript

The World of Wikis at UW-Green Bay

Prof. Lora Warner
Public and Environmental Affairs
Well, a wiki is a kind of software, it has some similarities to web sites, but the advantage of it is you can do a group project remotely. You can do it online, you can all add to a document, you can write it together, and you can make it very interactive. You can make it a lot of fun for the reader… a lot more interesting than a paper.

I’m teaching a large Intro to Public Policy class here at UW-Green Bay and we’re using wikis to add interest to their learning. They’re still learning the same content and they’re doing the same kinds of projects—studying a public policy issue— but I have found they get more interested, they get more enthusiastic and a lot more learning takes place when they’re using technology such as a wiki.

I use it here at UW-Green Bay as a tool, as opposed to an end in itself to be an exciting new thing they’re doing, it’s rather a tool where they’re using it to write a paper in a different format that they’re interested in.

There are a variety of reactions to (wikis). Most (students) are curious. Believe it or not, a lot of them don’t really know how a wiki works or what it is, so most of them are learning it. You have the whole range of reactions, some that are fearful of it, but most are intrigued by it and are interested in the idea of doing something more interactive.

Matt Vanevenhoven
History and Education majors/Wiki-using student
The overhead projectors are probably finding their way to the junkyard as this has come along. This is easy. Everybody in the school has access to it. We’ve gotten used to it. It’s fairly simple to use. It’s point-and-click directions and it’s idiot-proof.

Lora Warner
I do think this generation, they’re natives to the digital world and the electronic world, and so we have an obligation to at least try to meet them halfway and to do some things in their orientation to learning, (which is) much more technology-oriented. I feel like we have a responsibility to keep up with them, in a way.

It’s kind of funny. In class, sometimes I’ll have trouble with technology. Just today, ‘Try refreshing the screen, or double-click on this, or the bottom right of your computer will get this for you.’ So they’re just totally on top of it all.