making Blogs and Wikis more effective *and* efficient to use. It is harder than it might seem on first glance. I want to pick up the thread that Charles began about wikis taking more time. I think he's right, I've only used wikis on a small scale but it required a shift of how I mark (mainly in large batches). I needed to start to pay attention for a little bit of time each week and make some preliminary notes. By the time the end of the semester rolled around, I knew that my students were progressing, and had done a reasonably good job with the content. I think that wikis do show base conceptual understanding much better than other methods of assessment and provide a better gateway to higher levels of learning (Bloom's Taxonomy or otherwise). With that said, it's going to take more time to assess. Hi Chuck and Jon - yes I'd agree with you, particularly with respect to wikis. I'm not a massive fan of wikis, they nearly always tend to be messy I find unless people take real care. I think their use needs to be framed carefully - so on your point of saving time for instance, one use I suggested was that in a particular course students were having trouble with an assignment and found the (extensive) guidance confusing. I suggested wikifying this and giving ownership of the guidance to the students and tutors. There is a potential efficiency here in that you