CTCH 602- Wikis in the Classroom

Lynn Barnsback
CTCH 602
Spring 2009

Wikis in the Classroom: Opportunities and Challenges
John P. Workman, Jr.
Marketing Education Review, Volume 18 Number 1 (Spring 2008)

“When teaching a core curriculum class it is often a challenge to over come apathy & disconnect” (Shanahan, Hermans & Haytko 2006). In response to this situation the author introduced a Wiki project into a Principals of Marketing. The user generated content, developed over the course of the semester, was available online as marketing tool for the City of Omaha.

This idea came about to increase the student engagement. Since the majority of his students were non-marketing majors he felt this project he felt would appeal to them as well as help the marketing majors. It also met other goals; helping students communicate effectively, bring greater alignment across the instructors teaching research and service activities; helping student understand intellectual property & copyright laws.

The Project appears to be extremely well laid out and the author’s enthusiasm for the project is apparent. Students started off with a hand out summarizing editing commands. The wiki was set up so to the public could view it but only students could edit. They devoted 15 minutes per class to discussing the contributions. Each Class discussion about the wiki related to the chapter they were covering. For Example, the chapter on promotion created a discussion of user generated ads (Three 2007 Super Bowl ads had been done that way) and a logo design competition. It counted for 30% of their grades and the instructor tracked student edits. Individual students also provided lists of articles created, edits and uploaded photos, with narrative for the logic. This was used to establish whom to credit. The professor kept the momentum going by celebrating milestones (500th article) and reporting site traffic. He also arranged for the final presentation to be attended by various VP’s including the Omaha Convention and Visitors Bureau thus lending credence to the project.

He judged the success of the project based on the student questionnaire at courses end. He felt it was positively received, 70% said it was valuable, 81% had talked about it outside the classroom 97% wanted to see the site continue operation. The questionnaire also helped to understand how the students worked on the project with most of it occurring off campus indicating that the site access needed to remain open (IT had wanted to restrict it).

There were some comments by students who fled they missed out by not participating in a traditional Marketing Plan Project, something the author excused as an indication of problems with teaching innovations. Not enough information was provided to see if he is correct in this assumption, however, the point of a Marketing Plan is to learn the subject and it appears with the connections to each chapter that this goal was probably reached.

According to the instructor “The project does not seem beyond the technical abilities of most students.” He therefore felt that wikis could be used in different classes, and “provides a good basis for class discussion around content”. He also brings up the point of cumulative knowledge, expressing opinions and giving examples of wikis being used semester after semester to grow or being used across university boundaries to create true collaborative learning. He cites some challenges as well, the greatest of which is the time and technical expertise needed to manage the site. The author was pretty much on his own with little help from the university IT department. It seems that this would be a steep learning curve for the first time use that would improve after additional semester were completed. The second challenge is the time it took him to monitor the contributions and organize the content. The vandalism and verbal attacks that can occur with wikis were not a problem because of the restricted access.

The wikis do appear to “provide a unique opportunity for collaborative learning”. An instructor must be prepared to spend a substantial amount of extra time to develop, monitor, implement into curriculum, and cheerlead if necessary. I think making it an actual site recognized by the city lead to the success of the project, providing validation to the students. I am not sure if it is a good replacement for a Marketing Plan, and if it is worth the effort involved. It is however always a good idea to attempt to integrate new technology into the classroom if only to keep things fresh & relevant to the student body.