So I've been playing around with both pbworks and wikispaces. I like that both spaces are relatively easy to use. The free upgrade on wikispaces was nice. Love that both spaces are ad free. I really like the fact that comments are easy to see on pbworks, and find that the discussion tab on wikispaces isn't as intuitive. As far as functionality both seem similar. I am disappointed that I cannot lock certain wiki pages on pbworks without upgrading (unless someone knows something I don't know.) As a result, I will probably be working more on wikispaces.
I have many ideas about what to incorporate into the wiki. Things like student key points, documents, handouts, calenders, etc. I'm sure that the more I use a wiki, the more I will know what to incorporate into it.
On to blogs. I would really like to use a blog in my upper level classes to encourage critical thinking of science articles and videos. However, I'm really stumped as to which service to use. In the past, I've decided against using blogger, because I had a personal account, and did not want my students to have easy access to my personal account. I've also tried wordpress in the past and really liked the many different layout options that you could pick from, but I really don't want students to sign up for accounts. I would really like the ability to create student logins for the blog. Anybody have any thoughts? I did poke around the edublogs site. I'm a tad hesitant still i guess, but any suggestions would be welcome.
About your problems with blogs.. (keeping in mind I do not have much experience with blogs and wikis aside from this course) could you have students post their "blog" entries as discussions on the wiki? That way you could easily monitor everything that is being said, and watch discussions unfold. This way you would not even need to use a blog.
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