Deanz 2010:MediaWiki case study

Overview

 * virtualMe - Action research cycle 4:Research question
 * "Can a wiki be used to effectively deliver content in a blended teaching and learning environment?”.
 * To provide a tool to answer this a wiki was installed and has been used to deliver teaching and learning content.

Case study
The case study can be broken down into three parts
 * 1) Hosting
 * 2) Content construction
 * 3) Content delivery



Hosting using private MediaWiki because ...

 * Extensive use (Wikipedia)
 * Used by WikiEducator, Wikiversity, Wikibooks.
 * The software is Open Source.
 * Has an active extension community continually adding new functionality.
 * Supports a wide variety of multimedia types
 * Has the capability to be extended (e.g. add YouTube and Flickr functionality).
 * Enables the researcher to offer an informed contribution to the existing wiki communities.
 * Can be installed on a private host, enabling the researcher to gain an understanding of the technology underpinning the wiki.

Example page

 * Different hyperlink colors on same page

3. Delivery



 * Display in lecture
 * Text size + Zoom-it
 * Specialised code (link to external pages)
 * Connected media
 * Videos (Embed YouTube)
 * Presentations
 * PowerPoints (slideshare)
 * (public) Google presentation
 * User discussion
 * Twitter hash tag
 * Annotations
 * Amend actual pages
 * (Threaded discussion possible)
 * Student knowledge construction
 * Create own sub-wikis off user name

(those in italics added since paper written)