Wednesday, March 14^th 2018.

WEEK: 9

RANK: 3

Based on the article “Online Collaborative Writing Using Wikis”  by Paul Sze

A NEW TOOL TO IMPROVE WRITING

Internet has provided us with incredible tools to teach different skills, this article is about a new tool to improve or to practice English writing, but of course it can be used with other languages. Well you might be wondering... what is a wiki? Wiki is a website which students can work in groups and modify the content or the structure directly from the browser. So this means that is not necessary that students go to schools to work in a wiki, they can do it from their houses. In the article, one project was developed in Hong Kong where almost all families are equipped with internet access, great right? I wish we were like that in El Salvador. The article continues developing the project, students were asked to work in groups and write about different topics. I think wikis are an amazing tool to improve writing, but why? Well, because is a different and nice way to practice writing skills with the use of technology, sometimes students do not like writing on a simple paper with a pen or pencil, and they could feel more comfortable doing it at home without the pressure of the clock. What I mean is, we use the same activity to practice writing: ok, right now you have 15 minutes to write about what you did in your last vacation. What do you think about this method? Some students feel in a hurry and they make spelling mistakes, probably with wikis we could avoid that (depending on the level students are). Something else, at the beginning students felt weird, it was a little difficult for them but later they found it fun. So, it does not matter if at the beginning students feel uncomfortable or kind of lost using this tool, but they will get used to it. In conclusion, do not be afraid of using new and technological methods to teach/practice different skills, at the beginning it can be difficult but I think that wikis are the future of writing because as I say, students can do it from their houses and teachers can check paragraph, stories or quizzes from their houses to and the most important part for me: Students work in groups.