

When I began teaching technical writing, I decided to open select pages for student contribution. Allowing students to use wiki software not only teaches collaboration, it facilitates public and community discourse. Essentially, a wiki is a website with an open editing system. According to this essay from The Professional & Organizational Development Network in Higher Education, wikis can function as technological vehicles for exercising higher thought. Wikis also help introduce students to markup languages.

From VanderBilt U
"One of the primary reasons to use wikis is because they help your students reach Bloom’s higher order skills – things like creating and evaluating. Additionally, wikis achieve many of Chickering and Ehrmann good teaching practices including cooperation between students, active learning, prompt feedback from peers, time on task, the articulation of high expectations, and support for diverse talents.
Practically, we also think that wikis are a good tool to use because access and editing can be controlled by the instructor thus making a wiki public or private. Additionally, wikis are accessible online and include user friendly features that require little training. It’s likely your students will know exactly what to do!"