Lundin.+Teaching+with+Wikis

=**Lundin, Rebecca Wilson.** "Teaching with Wikis: Toward a Networked Pedagogy."= //Computers and Composition//. Ed. K.L. Blair. Volume 25, Issue 4, 2008. 432-448. Online.

Abstract
Computers and writing scholarship is increasingly turning towards the network as a potential pedagogical model, one in which writing is intimately connected to its social contexts. The use of wikis in first-year composition classes can support this networked pedagogy. More specifically, due to unique features such as editability and detailed page histories, wikis can challenge a number of traditional pedagogical assumptions about the teaching of writing. This article shows how wikis can challenge assumptions in four categories of interest to composition studies: new media composition, collaborative writing, critical interaction, and online authority. The analysis demonstrates that wikis, while not automatically revolutionary to composition pedagogy, hold significant potential to help facilitate pedagogical changes.

Argument
This article argues that the use of wikis in the classroom can encourage students to write and edit works as a social group. The author gives several reasons that wikis are a helpful tool in composition classes: 1) they "participate in network culture," 2) they "enact an ambitious version of hypertext," and 3) the editability and page history functions are unique to wikis. The article discusses four challenges to traditional assumtions of composition pedagogy, including the areas of new media composition, collaborative writing, critical interaction, and online authority. In conclusion, Lundin claims that through social and networked interaction, wikis encourage students to engage one another as social writers.

Key Passages
"The important difference between a wiki and most web design platforms is that wiki users can edit from within any web browser—specialized knowledge of a web-composing program like Dreamweaver is not necessary for wiki use."

"Although students writing on wikis are certainly influenced by the expectations of the structured environments with which they are already familiar, the flexibility of the wiki can encourage students to depart from such expectations."

"With projects like those at Bemidji State and the ability to facilitate collaborative writing assignments, wikis challenge the mode of composition teaching in which unconnected assignments are written by individuals and read solely by the teacher."

"The challenge of encouraging critical thinking is not particular to wikis or to networked pedagogies."

"Although wikis cannot completely overturn the hierarchies inherent in the classroom, they may make students feel more empowered to speak out, both against the teacher’s authority and in response to their peers’ writing."

"While the current article contributes to the emergent conversation both about the potential of wiki use and about the field of computers and writing, it is only the start of what I hope will be a long line of questioning about the use of wikis and their potential to challenge assumptions."