Library Learning 2.0 for Media Clerks: Thing #11 Wikis

So, what's a wiki?

A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide, the use and popularity of these tools is exploding.

Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content. Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what has been changed and by whom. Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed. Users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases, simple syntax structure is used.

As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries all over the country have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis, and even library best practices wikis.

Discovery Resources:

Use these resources to learn more about wikis:

Watch the TeacherTube video from Common Craft:

What is a Wiki? – Library Success wiki presentation
Using Wikis to Create Online Communities – a good overview of what a wiki is and how it can be used in libraries.

Discovery Exercise:

So what is in a wiki? For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at some wikis and blog about your findings. Here are a few library-related examples to investigate, but feel free to search for others that interest you as well:

SJCPL Subject Guides – a pathfinder wiki developed by the St. Joseph County Public Library system
The Albany County Public Library Staff wiki – an example of a wiki created for library staff to document procedures
Book Lovers Wiki - developed by the Princeton Public Library
Library Bloggers Wiki
Library Success: A best practices wiki
Colorado Learning 2.0 – an example of a wiki created to support a specific event
Explore the Wikipedia article: Wikipedia. Examine the history, reliability, the sections, and structure of the Wikipedia articles. Blog about your view of Wikipedia.

Homework Activity:

Practice in the Sandbox section of the Media Clerks Manual Wiki. You can try your hand at adding different kinds of content. Don't worry, we can remove anything -- just practice and, as the name implies, play in the sandbox!
Add to your assigned section of the Media Clerks Manual Wiki. This wiki will be used to develop a job manual of best practices for Media Clerks of the SVVSD. (This collaborative wiki will be presented as our final project for our PST credit). You will receive your invitation by email before class and we will draw for sections in class.
Add to, or edit one of the other sections of the wiki.
Remember, you can add links and support documents. Remember to cite your sources if you use outside information.
Reflect about your findings about wikis in your blog. What did you find interesting about them? What applications within libraries might work well with a wiki? Is this something you may use personally?