Wikispaces
is a tool used frequently in education because of its application of real life
learning in an online environment, allowing users to participate in discussion
in a simple and organised way. While there are some drawbacks to using this
type of platform for discussion, if used in conjunction with the de Bono
scaffolding many constructive viewpoints can be presented in order to present a
“whole picture” response to an issue.
Wikispaces
allows for social learning and collaboration, therefore it lies under the
constructivism theory and more specifically, social constructivism – the idea
that students can learn by sharing knowledge with one another. The fact that
posts were editable so that opinions/ideas/disagreements/agreements could be
expressed in an organised way is an obvious characteristic of a collaborative
environment. I believe this type of activity holds great value for students as
sometimes it is difficult to realise a different point of view until it is
mentioned to you. I believe it also applies to general constructivism where
prior knowledge is tapped into and used to complete a task. I found wikispaces
to be very similar to other forums I have personally used such as facebook and
reddit so I was able to easily transfer what I knew from those to wikispaces in
terms of formatting, navigation and the embedding of a youtube video and images,
as well as knowing general “netiquette”.
As
I was late to enrol in this subject I found I missed out on the crucial time
where the sharing of fresh ideas and raw discussion took place. However, after
browsing through the other students’ pages I found that most of my own ideas
and opinions on the subject of mobile phones in classrooms were universally
agreed upon so I do not feel I missed out. This is an obvious drawback to
anyone who is not available to participate straight away, as by the time I
viewed the pages a lot of the same ideas had been rehashed and mentioned
numerous times. Due to the high amount of self-edited information, Wikispaces
is also an environment where readers can be easily swayed by others opinions
and ideas. I can relate to this as I am impressionable and have the ability to
see all points as valid. While this is a good attribute or not, I’m not sure.
Sometimes
my thinking can be cluttered and unorganised. I tend to be cynical at the best
of times so I can easily focus on the negatives even if I know it is a great
idea. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier I am impressionable so I can see
all points as valid and have trouble making decisions. Because of this, I
particularly enjoyed the de Bono thinking scaffold which allowed me to “think”
in a sequential and organised way. I found it interesting that the Black Hat or
Negatives was placed first, because this is also the first aspect I focus on
when faced with an issue. I found that moving onto the other coloured hats
guided me to draw myself away from the negatives because usually I would remain
stuck on them, consequently getting even more confused about the matter.
All
in all, my wikispaces participation was a positive experience while being a learning
curve in regards to the way I think about issues that I come across in my
everyday life. I feel I am now able to face issues with confidence knowing that
it is okay to see the negatives, but it is important to then move on to
consider the other viewpoints. I found wikispaces to be extremely user-friendly
and I am eager to utilise the tool in any of the numerous group assessments I
have coming up.
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