Starting+classroom+wiki

=SETTING UP A WIKI FOR MY YEAR 9 ART CLASS=

WHY?
To engage students in learning using a variety of tools, including ICT. The class I chose was Year 9 in the 200 hour Visual Arts course. This class has students with a wide range of abilities from gifted to others with learning and behavioural difficulties.

HOW?
With an open mind, time and patience … baby steps ……


 * Step 1 Logged onto the school wiki site and find #25 tab WIKI JOURNEY. – some helpful information here.


 * Step 2 Created a personal wiki (had actually already done this) – this is where I can document my process to share with others as an open site – it’s also on-going and can encourage feedback.


 * Step 3 Created a yr 9 VA wiki following the easy steps. The address for my new class wiki is : http://year9va09.wikispaces.com/

Then took care of the aesthetics by following the easy directions on the home page: manage the wiki – create look and feel

I colour co-ordinated the wiki page to tie in with all my yr 9 folders, etc (Year 9 is BLUE for me)


 * Step 4 Looked up the student email addresses for my yr 9 class using the det portal…my applications…edu domain. I could usually find the student by just entering their last name, although in one case I had to put in only the first name as the student had a tricky hyphenated last name that the system didn’t recognize. (This was a fairly time consuming job and I am making recommendations for it to be simplified – see below*)

Then I made a list of the email addresses on a word document so that I could copy and paste them into the address bar any time.

Worth noting that some of the user names are not simply the first and last name. Also, thought the students’ email address would be similar to our det email address (ie firstname.lastname@det.nsw.edu.au but not so.

Student email address takes the form of firstname.lastname@education.nsw.gov.au

It would be great if (perhaps on edval) there was provision to record the students’ email addresses. This would simplify the process of finding the students individually for each class and then compiling their email address – it could all be on the one spreadsheet.
 * Recommendation

The Pre-test.
Am now at the stage where I need to get some information about how much (or little) my year 9 class know about a PLN and what access they have to computer /internet access. So I need to get a survey monkey together. Denise has helped with this and sent along the following link: Click Here to take survey

Struck problems getting year 9 to log on to their wiki...needed approval from DET only if the wiki is PRIVATE. Did the application and got this back so all is well: Your request to convert the year9va09 wiki into a complimentary Plus wiki for K-12 educational use has been approved. Enjoy, and spread the word!
 * =Welcome to Your Education Wiki=

Jump On In
[|Click here to visit your Wikispaces dashboard] . ==Want Another Education Wiki?== If you want to create more K-12 education wikis, you can use this link: [|http://www.wikispaces.com/t/x/teachers100K] and they will automatically be created as K-12 wikis. ||