TEACHING AND LEARNING PHYSICS USING WIKIS

It is essential to use new teaching tools and technologies in modern classrooms in universities, colleges and even schools. I report a new and powerful teaching tool: Wiki - an interactive webpage which can be accessed and updated collaboratively by a group of users via any web browser. This new teaching tool was used in an introductory level Physics course. The students were assigned different tasks and as a part of the learning procedure, they were encouraged to do independent research to explore applications related to the concepts learned in the class. As a result, students often brought interesting findings into the class that led to insightful discussions. Although Physics is not the most popular science subject among undergraduate students, the adaptation of Wiki showed a notable change in the students’ perceptions. Further, the newly gained conceptual knowledge to apply the laws of Physics to understand the applications made Physics a topic in the hallway discussions. As I experienced, there are number of advantages of using Wikis in a Physics classroom - it improves the writing and research skills; helps students explore and understand the subject in depth and most of all enhances their desire and ability to learn Physics.