dkimmey: So, here's a question for Steve and Glenn: The keywords assignment that you both used was originally designed before introducing the wiki as a technology. What possibilities did the wiki offer you that you hadn't anticipated? What other assignments could you see developing in light of the technology?

glennhendler: Hmmmm.....

tobiasucla: Every assignment in my class related back to the online discussions. This is the way you police their online work. They can do what they like online, but if they screw around, their paper/presentation will show it--publicly.

glennhendler: For me, the discovery was both the possibilities and the limitations of the wiki format. The wiki seemed good for archiving stuff that would be used later, and for revising. But not so great for holding discussions. They're used to Blackboard, which makes discussion so much more visible and readable.

tobiasucla: Yep. I agree. Things grow out of the wiki.

dkimmey: One thing that seemed underutilized to me was linking and "thinner" content.

glennhendler: Thinner?

dkimmey: Less text-heavy. In the sense that part of how a wiki functions is that it calls out to a user that knowledge needs to be added to make an entry more extensive is not necessarily by extending the article but rather by linking across to other keywords and connecting to other useful sites/resources.

glennhendler: Ah, yes, I see. Just one of my groups--actually, just one student--last semester included links in their work. (It was the "marriage" group, and they linked to a clip from The Princess Bride...and to my own wedding announcement!)

tobiasucla: They found my wedding stuff, too. Embarrassing when you've spent two weeks doing the Michael Warner critique. "If marriage is a social construct tied up in power, how come you're getting married?" I try to make lemonade: "These are not theoretical questions. They effect us all and are not simply rational choices."

dkimmey: Speaking of theoretical questions (and Warner's work on world-making), one thing I get out of the wiki connects with my pedagogy. Having come initially from psychology, I tend to think about classrooms as wonderful occasions to make what would be otherwise private conversation public. World-making, even. So, I'd like to ideally think that writing through the wiki makes it even that much more transformational.

tobiasucla: The wiki is not good for talking to people you know/can identify. It's good for addressing a public--a bunch of people that you have a general and yet specific sense of.

glennhendler: Yes, Steve, and that's a somewhat unfamiliar thing for a class to be doing. Unfamiliar to me, and also, I think, to them.

jentery: To be fair, I'm not sure the audience/public needs to extend beyond the class and, in fact, there's something to be said for insular approaches.

tobiasucla: The public doesn't extend beyond the class--it IS the class.

jentery: Well, it isn't if the wiki is public.

tobiasucla: Yes, but the students aren't thinking of it that way. They imagine the public as the class.

jentery: I'm certainly sympathetic to that argument. Here’s what concerns me, though: "EWP recommends instructors use UW software unless a compelling argument is made for an alternative. Such a case needs to be presented to the EWP director. If an instructor finds that UW resources are limiting, the use of password protected, secure sites (such as WordPress) seem reasonable. If an instructor makes a persuasive case to the EWP director for making blogs or other projects public, then she or he must have students sign consent forms and allow for exceptions if students are uncomfortable posting their work in public either pseudonymously or as directly attributed to the student (for safety or other reasons). Instructors should include in their course description that they will be asking students to blog publicly so students have a chance to opt out."

glennhendler: Wow. The idea that Fordham would have thought deeply enough to have a policy on that is.....amusing.

jentery: Well, I had to push for that "password protected" rhetoric. I met a lot of resistance to using something other than the UW's GoPost blogging system. AND one reason for why other instructors might have folded on "service" is the above language.

glennhendler: The thing about the wiki, though, is that they can use screen names that don't identify them, right? I know who they each are, but it's not quite the same as posting things publicly under their own names, is it?

tobiasucla: Had most students blogged before?

jentery: No. They had not blogged before.

glennhendler: Yeah, I find that my students' relation to this technology varies quite widely. Some barely function on e-mail; some have lived half their lives on social networking sites, and everything in between. Many think of blogs as things they go to and read, not as something they do.

dkimmey: I had students contribute to Wikipedia after using our wiki. That was great! And a lesson in what type of resource Wikipedia is...

glennhendler: I like that, Deborah.

tobiasucla: I do find that students fear wriritng — especially in public.

jentery: I must admit that I'm just quite sensitive about asking undergraduates to write publicly -- avatar or not.

glennhendler: I can see that, Jentery. And it's funny, because I'm the one who hated that idea at first. And quickly embraced it. Though quite frankly, I don't think the wiki is at this point all that public in the sense of scale--who's reading it other than the other students?

tobiasucla: Students cannot separate emotionally from their writing, the way they can from an incorrect math problem. Writing is who they are.

dkimmey: How do you make the "they" about the class and not about individual students?

jentery: The climate you create. And have them submit a collective wiki on a single word? With no names.

glennhendler: That's actually close to what I'm doing in my undergrad class this coming semester, Jentery. They're going to work the whole semester on the word "technology."

jentery: I would love to see the final entry/entries on technology. I'm doing a technoculture studies course this autumn.

glennhendler: Sure thing. And they'll be constructed on the wiki, so you can see it all along.

jentery: Good point!

tobiasucla: Sorry. Gotta go. I'm being kicked out of the library! The lights just went out. Summer hours. The security guard is here. Let me know if i can do anything else to help.

dkimmey: Absolutely. Thanks, Steve!

tobiasucla has left

dkimmey: Glenn, Jentery: can I pose a couple of questions that will be useful for me with the site and the panel? Both theoretical and practical questions ... What would have been useful in the "resources for instructors" section? Jentery, think here of your colleagues that were put off by the technology.

glennhendler: Deborah: all I can say is that I think it's always possible to get more and more detailed about how to operate the thing.

jentery: I agree.

dkimmey: Sample exercises?

jentery: Some sample assignments, too.

glennhendler: I like the idea of pushing for more linking--maybe making that explicitly part of the assignment. I wish there were instructions for those who get it intuitively, and instructions for those who need to be guided through every keystroke. And everything in between. Collaboratories For Dummies. Counting myself as somewhere in that category myself. I think I already answered the first part of that question with my line about its being a medium for collaboration in which the collaboration can be assessed and encouraged.

dkimmey: Sure. I can do that.

jentery: What about collaborative archive-making? It sounds basic, but simply focusing on one word does a lot. It's the independent variable of the course, in a sense.

dkimmey: Nice... I agree. In my class, we worked on "sexuality" but I think I muddied the waters a bit too much by trying to make every connection.

glennhendler: I'm going to be the experiment on that point because last semester I had a whole gaggle of keywords in the course, and this semester I'll just have one. And it's mostly the same group of students.

dkimmey: What about this, then: what would you say is the value that the wiki brings to the course? and what does a wiki about keywords bring to the course?

glennhendler: Specifically about keywords, that there's some correspondence (mirroring?) between the goal of a keyword essay (to open up questions, rather than close them down) and the form of the wiki medium.

dkimmey: Yes, I agree with you. Jentery, you may question the "mirroring" term ... but the point is still valid, right?

jentery: I guess my point was that, since media are culturally embedded, they help generate different dynamics. So a wiki will never mirror the classroom or vice versa.

dkimmey: Can I ask another question? How might you foresee using our Keywords wiki to bridge across different institutional spaces? Jentery, you mentioned earlier having other instructors pick up on the work you and your class produced... Are there strategies for doing that both within a particular institution (UW or Fordham) and across institutions?

glennhendler: Steve and I at one point corresponded about having a requirement that each member of our classes post one comment or revision on the other class's wiki. Though we didn't work it out (the quarter vs. semester issue was an obstacle there).

dkimmey: I remember. I guess, one thing I like so much about both the Keywords collection and the wiki is showing students very tangibly that the inquiry that grounds our class is germane to other classrooms and other critical sites. How to test the limits of that is something I haven't figured out.

jentery: i've merged classes before for cross-class presentations though each only had 22.

glennhendler: I've also thought about getting people to be guest members of the online class for a week. For instance, getting Bruce to participate in my wiki during the week we're reading and discussing his entry, or to help students along with their essay on sex. Obviously it would have to be someone you were confident would do it in the right spirit.

dkimmey: Like me! (self-promotion) ;)

glennhendler: You've just volunteered, Deborah.

dkimmey: lol.  Well... do you two have any final comments/questions?

glennhendler: That's all for me.

jentery: I'm good. Pleasure chatting with you two.

dkimmey: Thank you both (and Steve too!)