Virginia History Wiki

This wiki is a student project intended to demonstrate the potential applications of the wiki format for online education. The nominal subject of this wiki is the history of the U.S. state of Virginia, but its true purpose is an exploration of the form and function of the wiki itself.

About Me
The Virginia History Wiki was created by Christopher Goss, a graduate student at Colorado State University-Global Campus. Christopher is originally from Portsmouth, VA, and currently resides in Richmond. He has taught U.S. and world history in Pennsylvania and Colorado, and is currently pursuing a Master of Science in Teaching and Learning.

About This Project
The wiki format was chosen for this project for its open, collaborative qualities. Multiple users are empowered to create, expand, and edit content within an interconnected network of cross-referenced pages. Collaborative learning promotes the development of trust, communication, negotiation, and other important interpersonal skills. Wikis can be appealing tools in online education due to their high degree of accessibility; they do not require any specialized software or web development skills to create or edit wiki content.

The intended audience for this project is college-level students enrolled in a class on Virginia history. The wiki would remain in continuous use over multiple semesters with students contributing to a growing body of information on topics related to the history of Virginia and its people. Specific assignments might prompt students to create a new page about a topic that does not yet exist on the wiki, or to evaluate and expand existing pages. In this way, students would be encouraged to consider what information is most important, what kinds of sources lend credence to their claims, how to resolve competing claims over matters of fact, and how to distinguish matters of fact from editorial opinion.