Four Letter Words: how wiki and edit are making the Internet a better learning tool

By Stewart Mader

Technology is undoubtedly the language of an era in which connectedness is more important than boundaries. For ages people have defined boundaries - borders of countries, boundaries of empires, walls of cities - but now these boundaries are being erased to make way for greater progress, stability and cooperation. In the fall of the Berlin Wall and reunification of Germany, in the establishment and growth of the European Union, in the growth of global airline alliances like Star Alliance, OneWorld and SkyTeam - we see the benefits of connectedness. Germany elected its first female prime minister in 2005 and hosted the 2006 World Cup in gleaming new stadiums in 12 cities. The European Union has enabled countries in Europe to enjoy greater political stability and growing worldwide influence, a stronger single regional currency, and unprecedented economic and cultural growth. Airlines transport more passengers than ever, and 40% of the world's cargo by economic value,¹ sparking the rise of what UNC business professor John Kasarda calls the aerotropolis ² - a city built around the airport as its centerpiece.

In this connected society students are digital natives.³ They've grown up surrounded by technology as an integral part of everyday life, and are comfortable "speaking the language". In his seminal 2001 article Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants Marc Prensky says, "our students have changed radically. Today's students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach."⁴ Because many of its methods were developed before the rise of technology, education feels very much out of sync with the rest of the world digital natives are used to. Instructors who grew up learning in a step-by-step, lecture based, highly structured environment - the digital immigrants ⁵ - have difficulty adapting to and seeing the value in the multitasking, fast-paced, highly collaborative and boundary-less way digital natives prefer to work.

It is here that change must - and can - take place. Rather than blame students for not paying attention to long, theory-intensive lectures, and complain that students might not come to class anymore if technology is used, teachers should approach technology with an open-mind. By doing so, teachers can take advantage of the tools and language students are already using to build a better, more productive relationship with their students. Just as the ancient Sumerians used a stylus and tablet as their tools, and cuneiform as their language, and the Egyptians used papyrus as their tool and hieroglyphics as their language, so must we become fluent in the language of technology and use its various tools for greater connectedness, collaboration, and construction of knowledge.

This book focuses on one such tool: Wiki. A wiki is a web site that can be individually or collaboratively edited using just a web browser. No special tools and no special skills are required. At its simplest, it can be read just like any other web site, but its real power lies in the fact that groups can collaboratively work on the content of the site without constantly emailing Word documents and tracking revisions from multiple authors who can't see each others' changes. The wiki is gaining traction in education, as an ideal tool for the increasing amount of collaborative work done by both students and teachers. Students might use a wiki to collaborate on a group report, compile data or share the results of their research, while faculty might use the wiki to collaboratively author the structure and curriculum of a course, and the wiki can then serve as part of each person's course materials.

The most recognizable wiki is Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Wikipedia is the largest encyclopedia ever created - print or electronic - with articles in 229 languages,⁶ including 1,277,762 articles in english,⁷ 334,099 articles in french,⁸ and 423,250 articles in german.⁹ It's important to note that Wikipedia is one instance of how wiki technology can be used, and is the most open application possible since anyone with an Internet connection can edit, and can do so anonymously. This may sound radical at first, but the spirit of the idea is that a wiki enables collaboration on an unprecedented level, and this can be applied to a myriad of different situations in education to great benefit.

The name "wiki" is the Hawaiian word for "quick", and the name of the rapid bus service between terminals at Honolulu International Airport. Ward Cunningham, creator of the wiki idea, was looking for a recognizable, unique name and found it while travelling in Hawaii. In the relatively short time since he created the first wiki, WikiWikiWeb, on March 25, 1995 ¹⁰ a range of tools are now available for people interested in using a wiki. These range from free, open source software like MediaWiki to free or low-cost web hosted services in which you create an account and have your wiki up and running in minutes, to enterprise tools like Atlassian Confluence and SocialText which enable an organization to host multiple wiki web sites for an unlimited number of users. All are elegantly simple so that working with a wiki is - true to its name - quick. Unlike many software tools that have a steep learning curve, require training to use, and are advertised on the number of features included, wiki developers take the opposite approach. The resulting simplicity of the wiki has a compounding effect, that is, the more people use it, the more they want to keep using it and their contributions become vital to the growth of information and community.

Speaking of community, what makes a wiki unique is that it enables multiple people to see and collaboratively edit the same document, in the same "place". Here's where the wiki really resembles that Hawaiian bus service it was named for. People can easily come and go - some might make a small edit which is akin to riding the bus route for just one or two stops, while others might create new pages or make significant contributions and revisions to an exiting one, much like travelling the entire route on the bus. The wiki, like the bus itself, enables people to inhabit the same space, namely the page, and see the same thing, namely the text they are all editing, at the same time.

Before the wiki existed, collaboratively writing and revising a document might have gone something like this: one person would write a first draft, then email a word document to each collaborator who would in turn make revisions and email her copy back to the original author. The original author wold then have to find a way to combine all revisions into a new draft, and send that draft out for the group's approval. The logistics of this process - more formal, limited editing opportunities, blocks of time between contact with the document (while revisions are being compiled), and the individual nature of editing limit the degree to which the document evolves. Furthermore, the person charged with combining edits is faced with a very delicate situation. Imagine that two of the collaborators have edited the same paragraph and have differing views - how would the person combining edits choose which to include and which to leave out? A scenario like this could quickly undermine the progress of the group.

Now imagine using the wiki for this document. The original author might write the first draft on a wiki page, and share the address (URL) of that page with the other collaborators. Now, rather than "pushing" separate copies of the document to each person, all collaborators are "pulled" in to a central place where everyone sees the same text. In order to keep the revision process organized, the wiki keeps a revision history of the page containing the document so users can see the evolution of the document over time. Because people have direct access to edit the wiki and changes are made instantly each time the page is saved, people have the flexibility to edit more frequently, resulting in a more refined document. Remember those two editors with conflicting revisions to their respective copies of the emailed Word document? Now with the wiki they can see each other's edits as they're made, communicate directly with each other and perhaps debate their differing points of view, then make edits that are mutually agreeable. Unlike the email/Word scenario, the wiki enables voices to be heard so that even if one point of view ultimately prevails in the finished document both editors will have communicated directly with each other, and agreed on what revisions prevail.

The above example demonstrates the power of the wiki to make collaboration more inclusive and knowledge construction efficient, distributed and fast. If you think about this visually, the email/Word scenario has limited periods of creativity separated by the logistical and socially sensitive task of combining edits:

The wiki completely changes this by shifting logistics to the shortest possible segment of time at the outset, leaving a much greater period of time for collaborative creativity and knowledge construction:

"There is no 'typical' use for a wiki."¹¹

This book is intended to help you better understand how a wiki can transform what you do for the better. Through a compilation of case studies you'll see how different wiki tools have been applied to a variety of situations - from a major research university to a small liberal arts college, from open source to web-hosted and enterprise tools, from a high school technology course to a college freshman writing program. The first of these case studies illustrates how a wiki has been applied to a world-wide educational website to enable a growing community direct access to contribute and edit content. It also tells the story of how I became interested in the wiki.

Spectroscopy has something for everybody. Because it is the study of light interaction with matter, it is the science of seeing, whether with the naked eye or with highly precise instruments. It also relies on math to draw conclusions after data has been collected. For instance, in NMR spectroscopy, "the area under each peak or multiplet is proportional to the number of equivalent hydrogens responsible for that peak"¹² and students need to understand how to calculate this. But they also need to understand why they would use NMR spectroscopy in the first place, and this is where traditional ways of delivering information to students fall short. For example, the average chemistry textbook chapter is filled with theoretical and technical information, and usually has one page at the end briefly describing a novel application. This page isn't well connected to the rest of the chapter, and is even disconnected visually since a different layout and visual design are often used. Also, the fact that it appears at the end of the chapter means the best opportunity to engage and excite students might not even be seen. As a result, digital native students are left struggling to understand these concepts in the unified, big picture manner they're used to, and are left feeling that their digital immigrant instructors make their education not worth paying attention to compared to everything else they experience"¹³. This sentiment is manifested when disengaged students say, "I'm never going to use this in my career so why am I learning it?"

Faced with a situation where we needed to change how material was organized and presented, clearly illustrate its connections to everyday life and a range of careers, and maintain the interest of a wide range of students, we built a website. The Science of Spectroscopy www.scienceofspectroscopy.info was developed to engage students by first presenting a wide variety of applications, then leading to theory as the underlying explanation. From NASA projects to medical imaging, sunscreen chemistry, and microwaves, the applications are intended to appeal to the different interests of as many students as possible, and encourage them to understand how and why spectroscopy is used. This creates a learning environment in which theory and techniques can be taught with meaning, in which students will see relevance and meaning as they learn theory and techniques, instead of seeing it as useless and uninteresting.

Each application page gives a description and includes links to the appropriate pages describing the techniques involved and the underlying theory that explains the process behind the application. Some of the applications on the website include:

• Thermal Infrared Imaging - includes side-by-side visible light and infrared images of a wildfire in Yellowstone National Park. The visible light image shows just a cloud of smoke obscuring the land below, while the infrared image clearly shows the leading edge of the fire and the locations of hotspots. Links to pages describing how infrared light can be used to detect thermal signatures are embedded right in this description.
• Decoding DaVinci - a profile of Mauricio Seracini, an Italian art historian who uses X-ray, stereomicroscopy, and infrared imaging to look at the original drawings behind some of the world's greatest paintings. Author Dan Brown included Seracini as the only non-fictional character in The DaVinci Code because of the incredible stories of political subversion, religious mystique, and historical truth his work has helped tell.
• Digital Fish Library - a project of UC San Diego and the Scripps Institute of Oceanography to collect MRI images and data of the Institute's 2 million specimen fish collection and make them freely available in the Internet. This will enable scientists to instantaneously access spectroscopic data when they need it, instead of having to travel to the Institute and handle fragile specimens which degrade with exposure and handling.

Why did we start using a wiki?

As the site received publicity from reviews, publications, and conference presentations, an increasing number of users made suggestions, proposed new topics, and sent materials for us to add to the site, so it would better complement lessons and assignments. As the requests increased, I began to think how a system could be developed to get new material posted efficiently and with direct involvement from the community, which now included users from all over the United States, the UK, Germany Sweden, France, Australia, and Taiwan. While researching tools to help me manage the site, I discovered the wiki, which allows an entire community to maintain a site. The first powerful element of the wiki is ease of editing, and the second is its ability to keep track of the history of a document as it is revised. Since users come to one place to edit, the need to keep track of Word files and compile edits is eliminated. Each time a person makes changes to a wiki page, that revision of the content becomes the current version, and an older version is stored. Versions of the document can be compared side-by-side, and edits can be "rolled back" if necessary.

The ultimate goal of The Science of Spectroscopy is to become the most comprehensive source of information on spectroscopy available free of charge, and as I learned more about the wiki, it became apparent that it could do much more than simplify my work updating the site. It is the necessary tool to channel the support, involvement, and knowledge of a diverse community to:

• Create a clear, logical platform for any user to contribute content to The Science of Spectroscopy
• Ensure the long-term usefulness of The Science of Spectroscopy by creating a cycle of sustainability in which the content submitted keeps the resource relevant, and the resource's ease of use encourages any educator to submit content
• Introduce new content topics, such as cutting-edge applications of spectroscopy in astrobiology, space science and medicine, through collaboration with NASA Ames Research Center
• Increase the worldwide usability of The Science of Spectroscopy by enabling users anywhere to help build the site.

How did we design it?

"Because there is no physical analog to a wiki, designing an interface that allows multiple authors to simultaneously collaborate on multiple documents isn't an intuitive process. It's something that I, and many designers like me, are working out as we go along."¹⁴ A Wiki is both a technology tool and a community forum, and is unique in that it has no physical counterpart. This makes it both challenging because there's no exact historical precedent to guide the development of wiki software, or the conduct of wiki sites. This is also very liberating, and an example of the era we are just entering with technology, where new tools only exist in the online realm because they take advantage of maturing architecture that is only possible online.

For example, in order to make "writing" to the web easier, the makers of Wiki software have created a syntax that simplifies the code and reduces the time needed to perform common tasks, like linking. Using HTML, a link would be written:

and would appear in a Web browser as Skysight. Using Wiki syntax, the same link would be written:

and would appear in a Web browser just like the underlined link above.

For The Science of Spectroscopy, we designed the wiki to be as self-sufficient as possible, with a basic, obvious organization structure that mirrors how content was organized in the former, static site. The wiki main page has just three lists: Applications, Techniques, and Theory, and links can be quickly added as new pages are created. The only part of the wiki that is not "self-service" is account creation. New users must email a request to have their accounts created, so that we can screen out spammers and deter vandals or people looking to boost their search engine rankings by posting lots of links on wiki pages.

Engaging Teachers

One of the biggest barriers to involving teachers in technology-enabled curriculum development is how to solicit their input and build it into the curriculum in a meaningful way that makes the curriculum richer. Most technology tools only attract adventurous, early adopters because:

1. Copyright law is detailed, lengthy, and difficult to understand, so most teachers don't have the time or expertise to understand it. The gray areas in copyright law are so misunderstood and murky that if you ask ten different people, you'll get ten different answers, and each one will likely be to the benefit of the person answering you. This is a reflection on the complexity of the issue, and makes it really easy to see why people don't know what to do with materials.
2. Since the tools to create content have been had fairly moderate learning curves, most teachers haven't been inclined to create their own materials, even when they have the knowledge and expertise to do so.

Because of its natural ability to let authors focus on content over technology, almost-transparent yet familiar operation (uploading an image is like attaching a file to email, creating a link involves a syntax that looks more like natural writing than machine commands), and very low cost compared to most software, the wiki is showing potential to change how information is handled and built - potential whose precedent seems second only to the Internet itself. At its core, it really does enable people with knowledge and expertise in an area to focus on sharing their knowledge and collaboratively authoring materials. Coupled with the wiki, the growth of Creative Commons licensing is a critical catalyst because it provides an "in-between" full copyright and public domain, and a recognized way to give authors proper credit while legitimizing community editing and improvement so content stays fresh, comprehensive, and useful.

How one person's opposition to the project helped articulate the value of the Wiki

In January 2006, I was contacted by a professional organization for spectroscopy, which wanted to link to The Science of Spectroscopy. After we agreed on the link, etc. the organization's web editor indicated that he opposed the link because he felt that the content in The Science of Spectroscopy was not as extensive as the content in Wikipedia. Here's my response:

"The Science of Spectroscopy is quite different from Wikipedia, and the point of putting material on a wiki is to encourage others to make it more comprehensive, better, etc. as they see fit. As much as I respect Wikipedia, I think that we'd all be ill served if one person decided not to improve one site just because he thinks another one is better. There are people who place a lot of credibility on the fact that people have to request accounts to use The Science of Spectroscopy, which allows us to screen out vandals and those looking to improve their own site rankings in search engines by randomly posting links wherever they can.

While Wikipedia has a large volume of information befitting its role as an encyclopedia, the most important goal of The Science of Spectroscopy is to provide a place and a community where educators can come to work on curriculum together, using simple technology that transcends traditional school and geographical boundaries. Also, the way the wiki categorizes information by Applications, Techniques, and Theory, with Applications visible as the starting point is based on the original goal of the project. We want to engage students by showing how spectroscopy is important to their daily lives, and get them to ask why something works the way it does, so that when we teach theory they see it as meaningful, and more than just numbers or equations."

References

1. Greg Lindsay, "Rise of the Aerotropolis," Fast Company, July/August 2006, p. 80.
2. Lindsay, 78.
3. Marc Prensky, "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants," On the Horizon Vol. 9 No. 5 (2001): 1.
4. Prensky, 1.
5. Prensky, 2.
6. Wikipedia, "Accueil," 24 July 2006, # <http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accueil> (26 July 2006).
7. Wikipedia, "Statistics," <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics> (26 July 2006).
8. Wikipedia, "Statistiques de Wikipédia," <http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics> (26 July 2006).
9. Wikipedia, "Wikipedia:Statistik der exzellenten Artikel," 1 July 2006, <http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Statistik_der_exzellenten_Artikel>
10. Wikipedia, "Ward Cunningham," 25 July 2006, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_Cunningham> (26 July 2006).
11. Ken Tyler, "Embrace Change," 25 April 2006, <http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/seed_wiki/embrace_change> (26 July 2006).
12. Tom O'Haver, "Integration and peak area measurment," An Introduction to Signal Processing in Chemical Analysis, <http://www.wam.umd.edu/~toh/spectrum/Integration.html>, (February 3, 2006).
13. Prensky, 3.
14. Dave Elfving, "A Better Collaborative Interface," Machine Chicago, <http://www.machinechicago.com/> (February 4, 2006).