"using wikipedia to reenvisionthe term paper"

[Phoebe Ayers-2]

http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=15031&PRODUCT_CODE=ELI082/SESS07&bhcp=1

"To enhance the learning experience of a term paper, students were
required to publish their papers in Wikipedia. Publishing for a large
audience provided authentic feedback and encouraged students to do
their best work. Using Wikipedia also allowed students to connect with
a vibrant community and share their knowledge by making their papers
publicly accessible."

I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
research...

-- phoebe

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[Phoebe Ayers-2]

er, watched the presentation, rather.

I am watching the profession, and cringing ;)

-- phoebe

On Thu, Apr 10, 2008 at 5:25 PM, phoebe ayers <phoebe.ayers@...> wrote:

> http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=15031&PRODUCT_CODE=ELI082/SESS07&bhcp=1
>
>  "To enhance the learning experience of a term paper, students were
>  required to publish their papers in Wikipedia. Publishing for a large
>  audience provided authentic feedback and encouraged students to do
>  their best work. Using Wikipedia also allowed students to connect with
>  a vibrant community and share their knowledge by making their papers
>  publicly accessible."
>
>  I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
>  required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
>  can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
>  norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
>  research...
>
>  -- phoebe
>

--
- phoebe s. ayers | phoebe.ayers@...

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[Cormac Lawler]

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 1:25 AM, phoebe ayers <phoebe.ayers@...> wrote:

http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=15031&PRODUCT_CODE=ELI082/SESS07&bhcp=1

"To enhance the learning experience of a term paper, students were
required to publish their papers in Wikipedia. Publishing for a large
audience provided authentic feedback and encouraged students to do
their best work. Using Wikipedia also allowed students to connect with
a vibrant community and share their knowledge by making their papers
publicly accessible."

I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
research...

Yes, there are clear differences in methodology between a term paper and a Wikipedia article (completely aside from wiki versus non-wiki), as well as in genre of writing style, which is certainly non-trivial. But I still admire people who are taking the initiative in this regard - even if they are making mistakes (provided they/we learn from those mistakes!). There is an interesting ongoing writeup by an educator in the University of British Colombia about his experiences of a similar project: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jbmurray/Madness

Cormac

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[Janet Hawtin]

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 5:43 PM, Cormac Lawler <cormaggio@...> wrote:

> > I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
> > required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
> > can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
> > norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
> > research...

/me vouches for the tension between the individual paper as a product and
the collaborative participative wiki as a community and a process.
at some point you have to choose between one or the other model
and it is tricky if you dont know which youre doing up front -
especially for the co-authors.
j

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[Andrea Forte]

Indeed. I have had teachers try (enthusiastically try!) to do the
collaborative wiki writing thing and then find themselves reverting to
individual papers because it is not only familiar to them and the
students, but it is a genre of learning activity that fits more easily
within the dominant assessment regime. At least in American high
schools.

Phoebe, you totally nailed it with the observation about professors
often requiring original research. They do it because that's a
fabulous way to learn and it underscores an important tension: the
policies of Wikipedia were devised to support encyclopedia writing,
not learning.

Often it's productive for learners to freely explore wrong ideas in
detail, to develop their interpretations, etc. These kinds of issues
are precisely why I set up a student writing wiki separate from
Wikipedia, so that there would be freedom to ask students to write in
many different ways without bothering Wikipedians. In particular, I
really wanted them to be free to use original research and explore
possibilities. That's not to say that they don't eventually often
write material that is encyclopedic and appropriate for Wikipedia, but
the process is just different.

Andrea


On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 8:45 AM, Janet Hawtin <lucychili@...> wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 5:43 PM, Cormac Lawler <cormaggio@...> wrote:
>
>  > > I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
>  > > required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
>  > > can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
>  > > norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
>  > > research...
>
>  /me vouches for the tension between the individual paper as a product and
>  the collaborative participative wiki as a community and a process.
>  at some point you have to choose between one or the other model
>  and it is tricky if you dont know which youre doing up front -
>  especially for the co-authors.
>
>
> j
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  Wiki-research-l mailing list
>  Wiki-research-l@...
>  https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
>

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[Janet Hawtin]

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 11:00 PM, Andrea Forte <andrea.forte@...> wrote:

>  Often it's productive for learners to freely explore wrong ideas in
>  detail, to develop their interpretations, etc. These kinds of issues
>  are precisely why I set up a student writing wiki separate from
>  Wikipedia, so that there would be freedom to ask students to write in
>  many different ways without bothering Wikipedians. In particular, I
>  really wanted them to be free to use original research and explore
>  possibilities. That's not to say that they don't eventually often
>  write material that is encyclopedic and appropriate for Wikipedia, but
>  the process is just different.

some wikis have incubators for formative work
again the challenge is that it is hard to collaborate if the purpose
is not explicit
sometimes that is hard if it is experimental

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[Mark Bell]

I am currently using Wikibooks to compile theory and methods in my
discipline for my comprehensive exams. To me, my theory class could
have been doing this all along. Has anyone used Wikibooks in the
classroom to create the textbook? I know Curtis Bonk at IU has done
some of this.

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 9:41 AM, Janet Hawtin <lucychili@...> wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 11:00 PM, Andrea Forte <andrea.forte@...> wrote:
>
>  >  Often it's productive for learners to freely explore wrong ideas in
>  >  detail, to develop their interpretations, etc. These kinds of issues
>  >  are precisely why I set up a student writing wiki separate from
>  >  Wikipedia, so that there would be freedom to ask students to write in
>  >  many different ways without bothering Wikipedians. In particular, I
>  >  really wanted them to be free to use original research and explore
>  >  possibilities. That's not to say that they don't eventually often
>  >  write material that is encyclopedic and appropriate for Wikipedia, but
>  >  the process is just different.
>
>  some wikis have incubators for formative work
>  again the challenge is that it is hard to collaborate if the purpose
>  is not explicit
>  sometimes that is hard if it is experimental
>
>
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  Wiki-research-l mailing list
>  Wiki-research-l@...
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>

--
Mark Bell
PhD student in Indiana University's Telecommunications program
SL: Typewriter Tackleberry
http://www.indiana.edu/~telecom/
http://swi.indiana.edu/
http://www.storygeek.com
"Communications tools don't get socially interesting until they get
technologically boring." - Clay Shirky

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[Phoebe Ayers-2]

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 1:13 AM, Cormac Lawler <cormaggio@...> wrote:

>
>
> On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 1:25 AM, phoebe ayers <phoebe.ayers@...>
> wrote:
> >
> http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=15031&PRODUCT_CODE=ELI082/SESS07&bhcp=1
> >
> > "To enhance the learning experience of a term paper, students were
> > required to publish their papers in Wikipedia. Publishing for a large
> > audience provided authentic feedback and encouraged students to do
> > their best work. Using Wikipedia also allowed students to connect with
> > a vibrant community and share their knowledge by making their papers
> > publicly accessible."
> >
> > I haven't watched the profession, but the sentence "students were
> > required to publish their papers in Wikipedia" makes me cringe. One
> > can only hope the professors introduced them to (or understood) the
> > norms and policies of the site, and didn't require original
> > research...
> >
>
> Yes, there are clear differences in methodology between a term paper and a
> Wikipedia article (completely aside from wiki versus non-wiki), as well as
> in genre of writing style, which is certainly non-trivial. But I still
> admire people who are taking the initiative in this regard - even if they
> are making mistakes (provided they/we learn from those mistakes!). There is
> an interesting ongoing writeup by an educator in the University of British
> Colombia about his experiences of a similar project:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jbmurray/Madness
>
> Cormac

I just discovered Jbmurray's project the other day, and was going to
post to this list about it as well! It's fantastic. He went through
and had his upper-level students bring a bunch of stubs about Latin
American literature up to GA/FA status.

That seems like a particularly good project, because you are a) making
people who have something of a background in the field do the
research; and b) if you start with a stub chances are better that the
topic is notable, won't get deleted, etc.; c) you end up with FAs --
win all around.

Anyway, I think he is interested in feedback and talking more about
his project/similar projects.

Also, I've been talking to Jay Walsh at the Foundation -- he fields
requests from professors occasionally who are interested in learning
more about teaching wikipedia or using it in their classroom. I know
there's already a project on en:wp, but it seems like it would be
useful to try to put together a more polished packet of materials to
hand out to professors who want to use Wikipedia for their
assignments, especially when there isn't a volunteer free to work with
them one-on-one.

-- phoebe

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[Alex Halavais]

I had a go at this with my students in a small class a couple years ago:

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Communication_Theory

And I'm doing something similar now:

http://newcompro.halavais.net

It's not an easy thing, but it's fun to play with, at least. Not sure
how effective it is. Had I continued to teach the Com Theory course, I
probably would have iterated that textbook a bit and had students edit
and expand, as well as doing original chapters.

Best,

Alex


On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 9:45 AM, Mark Bell <typewritermark@...> wrote:
> I am currently using Wikibooks to compile theory and methods in my
>  discipline for my comprehensive exams. To me, my theory class could
>  have been doing this all along. Has anyone used Wikibooks in the
>  classroom to create the textbook? I know Curtis Bonk at IU has done
>  some of this.
>


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