Anna+Piejka

=Anna Piejka //993275488//=

//Wiki name alias: anna266//2 toc

total edits: 322 = =

//Wiki Experience//

 * CCT333
 * Over The Hill Explorers
 * CCT205

//CCT333 Wiki Contributions//

 * Created and added pages to the navigation bar to help classmates with addressing commonly asked questions about:
 * A1: Analysis FAQ's
 * A2: Wiki FAQ's
 * A3: Project FAQ's
 * A4: Final Test FAQ's
 * //Posed questions and added answers to classmates' questions in the FAQ's//
 * Added content to course homepage: provided external link to firefox
 * Edited formatting on several pages (sizes, bullets, table of contents, horizontal rules)
 * Corrected spelling and grammar mistakes
 * Group Wikispace //(Over The Hill Explorers)//
 * added content to all pages
 * edited navigation bar
 * formatted all pages (sizes, bullets, table of contents, horizontal rules) for consistency
 * Created own content pages on CCT333 wiki
 * Engineering Psychology
 * Forms and Design
 * Scannable Text (not part of main two for marking)
 * Converted and formatted all lectures into Microsoft Word format (.doc) and linked it to the Final Test Help page
 * Contributed content to other pages on CCT333 wiki
 * Accessibility
 * Universal Design

Beginning of Course
We don't always come up with the best ideas on our own and collaboration helps us shed light on new ideas. It provides us an alternative method of thought. Collaboratively adding pages and editing content is a great way for a class to maintain communication outside the classroom. All of the information that students need are available on this wikispace. From the course outline to downloadable lecture notes to FAQ pages, students can help each other. Furthermore, students like myself who are introverted and are shy to meet people in new settings can communicate with each other online and help one another out on concepts that they may be too afraid to ask a professor. The wikispace environment is wonderful.

I have previously used the wiki. Last year I completed a course at Sheridan College ([|CCT205] with Professor Benick and Professor Jones). That's where I learned about the power and advantage of the wikispaces. In that course we had both WebCT and the course wiki. The one that put us at a far better advantage at learning was the wiki. Everything that we needed to consult was available on the space. It was updated pretty much updated by the minute by someone in the course. Questions would be addressed by my peers in FAQ pages, and we helped each other with ideas on topics. Furthermore, studying for a test would be much easier. My classmates and I posted notes and cleared up concepts thoroughly together. A person answered a question, and another person would add to the answer to make it more specific and clear.

My past experience with the wiki allowed me to become familiar with how to use the functions in the wikispace. I believe that I could contribute my knowledge to help those who may be novices. Although I am experienced with how the wikispace works I look forward to expanding my knowledge in the content in this class and helping others. Expectations of myself include trying to take time out of my schedule weekly to frequent the site and make edits and additions to other people's content. I believe that consistency in design is important, so I will try to maintain that throughout the pages in the wiki by adding edits.

Middle of Course
The wiki has come along great. At first this concept of online collaboration for a wikispace seemed too challenging of a task. For the amount of people enrolled in the course, it seemed like a difficult thing to ask for people to respect each other's pages. The Internet is known to us as a place where we can freely express our ideas and we can write anything we wish. But with time I've witnessed this come together gracefully. With establishing the netiquette, we've all agreed on a set of writing and editing standards. All of the members of this space are well aware of what is to be expected of us.

Initially I believed this space would lack organization. But once the main pages were set it was easy for people to navigate through the site, create their own pages, and link them to the main pages such as the Table of Contents and Student Aliases. In a way this concept of sharing and exchanging information and assisting one another to create pages resembles that of [|WebCT]. In WebCT however, students are limited with their actions. Here, new pages can be created and edited and we aren't limited to content. Also, responses are much faster. I've noticed that in the past if questions were posted on WebCT it took a couple of days to be answered. Sometimes we have time constrictions and last-minute questions and need answers to our questions fast. Here, many students frequent the site and can maintain stronger and better communication.

I frequent the site a few times per week. I try to stay informed with what is going on in the space since pages change every day. I don't necessarily log on and pick and choose which postings to contribute to. Rather, I visit pages that inform me about the course assignments and FAQ's to make sure I'm on the right track with assignments. If there are any questions someone has that I can answer I try to add that into the page. Then, I go through the table of contents and browse through topics that I've covered in other classes I've previously completed. I've looked through notes and textbooks from other classes and add information to my classmates' pages. I think it's great that we can add information to people's pages because it helps us learn collaboratively. It's been very effective because it helps us expand our knowledge and shed light on facts or ideas we may not have thought of on our own.

I regularly check my own postings for alterations. I want to make sure that my content isn't deleted but so far I haven't experienced many problems. In turn, I make sure to respect my classmates' work by not deleting any information they've already written, but I'm sticking to simply adding additional information to their pages. It's important that my classmates' work gets credited and from what I've seen, the respect has been mutual. I've corrected spelling and grammar mistakes and altered some formatting, but other than that I believe it's important to keep information written by others the way it is.

End of Course
My views in regards to collaborative learning has changed since the beginning of the course. I addressed this in the reflection in the middle of the course, and since then my opinions still remain unchanged. With the help of my peers and the professors we have reached the ultimate learning community. It's so great how we learn in-class, but it doesn't stop there. We expand our knowledge by sharing and exchanging new ideas in our homes. All of the dust has settled in a way. In the beginning stages of the space, information was at the surface level. Now it is at the deeper level. All information is structured, organized, and explained thoroughly. One person creates a page with a few sentences. A classmate adds content to previously written information. Another student formats the page to be organized and consistent with other pages, incorporating a table of contents within the page, adding photos, prioritizing information using headings, etc. I have to admit I was skeptical in the beginning of how organized this space would be, but I've been proved wrong with time. Everything has come together gracefully within this space, as I predicted in the middle of the course.

Despite this, I have a few problems I've encountered with my time on the wiki. I'd like to address a few and offer suggestions for improvement. First, the font sticks sometimes. In discussed this with one of my team members in my group wikispace for the final project (OTHEX). In our raw results we wanted the answers to the questions to be in bold formatting. The bolding would stick and for some reason we couldn't get rid of it. The formatting became irreversible once it was saved. Of course an option would be to go into the page's history and simply revert to the old version, but then all other changes would also be erased. Microsoft Word offers reverse bolding by simply clicking on the Bold button. This wikispaces editing toolbar should function in the same way.

Another issue is that restrictions should be set where only one person can make changes to one page at a time. If two people make changes simultaneously and one wishes to save it, it makes it difficult because you have to make sure you don't overwrite what the other person wrote. A message pops up in a new smaller window acknowledging that another person has been working on a draft of the same page and asks the user to either load the previous draft or discard the changes. This is a confusing and unclear message. I don't know what the changes are, so I don't know if I want to discard the changes or load the previous draft, but I also don't want to lose the changes I've made. The pop-up screen does not offer a clear feedback explanation - the user is left confused and doesn't know which to press.

The final issue is the formatting toolbar. This is only available at the top of the screen. If I have a long page like this one and I'm working at the end of the page, I have to scroll all the way up to the top of the page to access the toolbar so I can create a link. A possible solution would be to incorporate a floating toolbar. The user can adjust the size of the screen and set the editing toolbar next to the browser page. That way, all buttons are available simultaneously, eliminating the need for scrolling. I use a laptop without a manual mouse. Often times when I select a word and want to make it a hyperlink, by the time I've scrolled to the top I've managed to press the built-in mouse and now my text isn't highlighted. Having a floating toolbar is much easier for the user if it is accessible from all areas of the page.

Besides these factors, I believe this is a great and effective tool for all users. Whether creating a page and limiting it to friends and family members for sharing photos and memories with, using it as a personal online journal or diary, or using it for class purposes such as this one, this wikispace is wonderful. Novice users aren't overwhelmed with functions, and I find it is very usable for many audiences using the Web. As soon as I signed up for wikispaces it was easy to get started and catch on to the various useful functions.

I love how simple the interface layout is. The mapping is great - it's consistent with many websites available on the Internet. Links are colored blue and underlined, photos are easily added, text can be formatted, actions can be reversed, icons are clearly represented. Another great feature is prioritization of information - important and most used functions are presented first and formatted separately from other text using headings and color. What is great is that the user is initially guided on what actions to pursue. If the user is confused about something, they can troubleshoot by visiting the help section of the homepage. Proper constraints are set. At the same time, the wikispace allows room for personalization. Any person can be engaged with making their wikispace their own. By clicking "Manage Space", the user can access tools that can change the colors of the background, links, and text among other things.

It's amazing how everything came together so well in this course wikispace. This could not be accomplished if we were using any other method of learning and communicating. I certainly could not gain an equal (or better) learning experience from using [|WebCT] or [|CCNet] as a course tool as I have with wikispaces. It's great that such collaborative learning environments exist like this one. = =