Wiki Training
From BlueOxen
Contents |
Philosophy
Our basic approach to teaching Wikis -- and all online collaborative tools, for that matter, is to start with people's physical intuitions. (See Online Tools As Space.) You can create a visceral, Wiki-like experience using nothing more than paper, pen, and whiteboard. One of the cultural points you want to hammer home is that there is no wrong way to use a Wiki. (See Collab:Wiki Zen.) Try and learn iteratively!
Once you've established that physical intuition, you can dive into the tool itself. These can be short -- 15 minutes is often adequate -- and are preferably highly experiential.
Curriculum
I like to spend at least half of our tech trainings on strategy and conceptual frameworks -- how to think about the tools -- before diving into the technical/operational aspects of the specific tools. Anyone can teach you how to walk through a Wiki, and frankly, you can go through that exercise in 15 minutes or less. What's really important are the broader issues.
Strategic
Collab:Shared Display is really important. Wikis work, because they act as a Shared Display.
If you have some time, then Collab:Tic-Tac-Toe works as an excellent Collab:Ice Breaker. It gets people moving and engaged, and it's topical.
The stock exercise I like to use is to simulate email and Wikis using paper and a whiteboard. Frame a question: It can be topical ("Come up with a list of priorities for our strategic meeting") or whimsical ("Come up with a list of restaurant recommendations"). Attack the problem two different ways:
- Using paper (email simulation). All new ideas or commentary must be written on a new sheet of paper. No talking allowed.
- Using the whiteboard (Wiki simulation). Only one person may write on the whiteboard at a time. Again, no talking allowed.
If you have a small group, do both exercises sequentially. With larger groups, you can split the group into three, and run the exercises in parallel with one group observing.
Debrief.
These exercises are great, because they surface many elements of the Wiki Way without having to deal with the technical aspects of using a Wiki.
Technical
The best way to teach the technical aspects is to dive into the exercises as soon as possible. Key things to explain up-front:
- A Wiki is a web site that anyone can edit. Point out the Edit button.
- Collab:Link As You Think. This has a practical purpose, and it also helps groups develop Collab:Shared Language.
- Recent Changes is your friend. Use it often.
- If you have time, it's also good to walk through the page history.
- There is no wrong way to use a Wiki. See Collab:Wiki Zen.
You can either use a projector or have everyone in front of laptops. If there aren't enough laptops to go around, you can pair people into groups of 2-5.
One of the challenges in crafting an exercise is that you can't edit a Wiki page simultaneously. An easy way around this is to have people edit their own user pages. If you're using MediaWiki, everyone has a User page by default. With other Wikis, you will have to pre-create links to user pages. Have people:
- Write something about themselves on their pages.
- Click on Recent Changes, and browse.
- Edit someone else's page, and make a comment, or ask a question.
- Click on Recent Changes, and browse again.
References
Related Ideas
Examples
Participatory Media / Collective Action 2006
Taught by Howard Rheingold and Xiao Qiang at the UC Berkeley School of Information in the Fall of 2006. (Course Wiki.) Eugene Eric Kim is leading a Wiki workshop for the class on October 6, 2006.
The class is in South Hall. If you come into the campus through Sather Gate (Sproul Plaza), you walk over a walkway where the students have signs for their clubs, and then you take a right at the first opportunity, in front of a big library. South Hall is an ancient red brick building on your left. It faces the Campanile. The class is in the big lecture room at the end of the second floor.
