Using wikis to promote independent work in the 14-19 MFL classroom

What is a wiki?

A wiki is a collection of web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content. They can be set up and modified quickly and easily and no specialist programming knowledge is required. It is possible to set a wiki so that only the teacher can modify content. Many providers offer a basic but cost-free wiki with perhaps 100MB of memory for content. This is enough to create a substantial wiki site, which may be used to develop collaborative writing, to provide a focus on grammar, to enable guided exam revision or to promote independent research into aspects of another country’s culture.

Key features

• Easy to use: wikis can be created in minutes and edited very easily by all users with appropriate permissions. No programming expertise is required.
• Versatile: text, images, interactive exercises, audio and even video can be uploaded to a wiki. The free memory allowance is not infinite and the providers hope to entice users into buying an enhanced version of the wiki with large amounts of memory. However it is a relatively simple matter to set up more free wikis and place links to them on the home page of the first wiki.
• Appealing: students find wikis give them a degree of ownership of the learning process. They are also familiar with being able to contribute collaboratively online from blogs or social networking sites such as Facebook.
• Multi-purpose: wikis can be used to focus on writing skills, grammar,  vocabulary, cultural knowledge, listening skills, project work and much more.  They can also be used to generate resources which students can access or teachers can use for whole-class work on the interactive whiteboard. Hyperlinks to educational wikis can be placed on the school’s website or Virtual Learning Environment (VLE).
• Excellent tool for collaboration: wikis can be used as a way of sharing ideas amongst teachers as well as for inter-student collaboration.
• Robust: it is possible for anyone with the password to delete the entire contents of the wiki, accidentally or otherwise. However, any such deletion can always be reversed by the teacher at the click of a mouse.