**Writing+&+Discussions+with+Wikis**

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Overview
Wikis are **simple** web pages that groups, friends, and families can edit together. Each page has its own **discussion area** to keep your discussions separate from your wiki pages. A teacher can setup **notifications** for all messages in a space in order to keep track of all discussions in the community. //Discussion Ideas://
 * Guided Reading Responses
 * Student Feedback for Projects
 * Story Ideas
 * Explain thinking for processes
 * Class News
 * Current Events
 * Reflections for Reading
 * ...and more!

EQ
How can wikis discussions be used to help students develop good reading skills and habits?

Vocabulary
wiki, history, notification,

Activating Strategy
Engage in a Wiki Discussion

Teaching Strategy & Guided Practice
Visit Wikis with Students

Main Page
Each editable page on Wikispaces has an Edit button at the top of the page. Sometimes the button will look slightly different or be in a different place but it should always be easily recognized. Click on this button to bring up the page editor. The page editor allows you to add text and pictures to a page and to format that page.

When you are in the Edit mode for a page, you will see options on the toolbar at the top of the page. You can bold, italicize, underline, and •bullet text; format text in various headings; or add a horizontal line break to your page. You can also change the font, color, alignment, or size of your text.

//**What to Write?**//
 * Write Your Story
 * Penpals

Discussion Tab
A discussion page is a forum where people can post and respond to messages. Each page on Wikispaces has its own discussion page. On a discussion page, you can start a new topic or you can participate in an existing one. For each discussion topic, you can see its author, how many people have viewed or replied to the message, and when the last reply was.

To go to the discussion page, click on the Discussion tab at the top of your wiki page.

**//What to Discuss?//**

 * RSS feeds
 * Story Themes
 * Science Topics
 * Current Events

History Tab
Each version of each page on Wikispaces is saved. You can see all the previous versions of a page by going to the History tab at the top of the page. On the history page, you can:
 * Click on a version of the page and see what changes were made by which person.
 * Compare any two versions to see changes between them.
 * Revert to a previous version of the page.

Notifications
Notifications by email or RSS can be setup for all messages on a page or all messages in your wiki. Visit My Account to set your preferences to receive e-mail notifications when people respond to one of your previous discussion posts. This feature is great for managing/monitoring discussion posts by students.

Extended Thinking
•• Need a wiki? Contact Shari Dusman with the name of the space and she will create it for you! ••

Summarizer
Summarize your plans for using a wiki discussion with students on the [|session wiki discussion tab] or on the wiki talks wallwisher.

Wiki Resource Links
rss url="http://www.diigo.com/rss/user/Mmkrill/wiki" link="true" description="true" number="15"

Handout
media type="custom" key="6671935"

Teaser media type="file" key="wiki.wmv" width="300" height="300"