Digital skills for collaborative OER development/Digital skill challenges/Pedagogical templates tasks

Media

Demonstrating how to publish a pedagogical template using wiki text

This screencast provides an overview of the main tasks for this learning challenge:

1. Creating a subpage on your sandbox to practice publishing and customising pedagogical templates.
2. Where to find the wiki text to copy for creating a pedagogical template
3. The basics for saving and editing a pedagogical template.

(Note this is a low resolution video, but viewed in full screen mode you should be able to see where to find the links and how to publish a pedagogical template.)

Create a subpage in your sandbox for practising templates

1. Log in to WikiEducator and go to your Sandbox (link at the top of your browser).
2. Create a subpage from your Sandbox page for practising pedagogical templates.
   • Using the VisualEditor (click "Edit" link), type the name of your subpage, for example "Pedagogical templates".
   • Highlight the words you typed and click on the link icon.
   • Important: Because you are creating a subpage, you must preface the label you've typed with a forward slash ("/"), for example "/Pedagogical templates".
   • Click on the "Save page" button, add your edit summary and save.
   • Your Sandbox page will now display the name of your subpage with a red link, indicating that the page is a place holder for text you will add later.
3. Create the page by clicking on the red link and adding some text, for example "My place to practice pedagogical templates". Save the page.

Source the wiki text for pedagogical templates and familiarising yourself with the options

1. Visit the Quickstart guide for pedagogical templates. This can be accessed on the WikiEducator homepage from the Help link on the left-hand side of the screen.
2. Read through the quickstart guide noting the range of predefined templates and corresponding wiki text for changing the type parameter, for example |type=Activity. Note that:
   • parameter names are case sensitive—they should always be lower case.
   • you can only use the predefined types listed.
   • you can customise the label associated with the icon using the title parameter.
3. Copy the wiki text syntax displayed near the top of the Quickstart guide for pedagogical templates.
4. Go to the subpage on your sandbox you created above for practising pedagogical templates.
5. Important: Click on the Edit source link because wiki text will not work using the VisualEditor.
6. Paste the wiki text for the pedagogical template you copied above onto your practice page.
7. Save your page.
8. If you have carried out the steps correctly you should see an empty template published on your practice page.

Practice editing and customising your pedagogical templates

1. Click on the "Edit source" link for your practice subpage. The wiki text specifying the pedagogical template will be displayed inside curly brackets.
2. Choose a pedagogical template type, for example "Media" or "Case study" and type this next to the "|type=" parameter.
3. Type your practice body text, for example "This is practice body text" next to the "|body=" parameter. Note that you will need to use basic wiki text for layout and formatting of the actual body text. (See Quickstart guide for basic wiki text for more information.)
4. Save your page.
5. Practice changing the theme by typing "wikieducator" or "line" next to the "|theme=" parameter (For the purposes of this course, there are only two themes available.)
6. Choose an icon which would work with an alternate display title, for example the question mark could be used with a title "Test your knowledge". Type an alternate title next to the "|title=". Note, this is a useful way to customise templates to adapt IDevices for your own context.

Remember to share your learning journey with our community by posting regularly on WEnotes below, OERu forums or Twitter and include the hash tag "ds4oer" where appropriate.