Wikipedia

=Wiki = =[|WikiWiki] is the Hawaiian term for quick or fast= What is a wiki? Wiki is an acronym that stands for: =**W**hat **I K**now **I**s= = = =**The Wisdom of the crowd**= And so, the idea behind wikis is that those who know will contribute their knowledge and ideas, revising and editing one piece of work, to create a fluid page that is a true collaboration. Ideally, the concept would lead to the realization of the whole being more than the sum of its parts. This is all to align with the concept of //collaborative technology// which continues to shape how business is being conducted today and how we must prepare our students for that work environment.

=How accurate is Wikipedia?= This website you are viewing is our wiki providing ongoing collaboration, development, enhancement and support for using technology throughout our curriculum and instructional practices everyday to advance the achievement and knowledge base of every student in our district.

=[]= Concern about Wikipedia's potential for inaccurate information and students' tendency to go to it first make it a hot topic among teachers assigning research projects. Information from Wikipedia, like information from all resources and particularly those on the Internet, should be verified by checking it against other sources. That said - what Wikipedia is:
 * often used by college instructors
 * a compilation of 1.8 million articles that undergo approximately 130,000 edits per day
 * a site that receives 25 million visits per month with only 1-2% of the visitors contributing

//In Real Life://
 * Examples of Group Knowledge**
 * Democracy - 1 man, 1 vote
 * The jury system
 * The stock market
 * Horse race odds

//In Cyberspace://
 * Amazon and other shopping sites' customer reviews
 * iTunes scales
 * Google Page Views
 * Trip Adviser reviews

From: [|Wikis Make Learning Wicked Fun]
 * Advantages of using Wikis with students:**
 * Relatively simple technology
 * Promotes "real-world" collaboration skills
 * Fosters richer communication than synchronous communication
 * Pools strengths of many
 * Assessable, easy to track
 * Online collaborative writing produces higher quality writing than face-to-face collaboration (Passig and Schwartz 2007)
 * Concerns:**
 * Security/safety issues
 * Potential for biases
 * Labor for moderator
 * Combating "Copy and paste" philosophy
 * Potential for inequitable work distribution by contributors