Hey Alex,
Yes a lot of that has been my starting point. FWIW there is a lack of
content for the younger age groups (say 14-16) which is where my current
focus is; the "beginner" guides are more suited (at least in my experience
of teaching) to older students. I'd also like to see some more material on
the goals/ideals of Wikipedia (as that seems a better start point before
leaping into account creation :)).
Also I noticed that a lot of the focus is on editing or contributing
Wikipedia. I've approached this from a slightly different perspective -
which is that most of the kids I will be talking to aren't interested in
writing (and probably aren't yet capable of doing so) a Wikipedia article.
On the other hand I aim to teach them about using WP as a resource (and the
potential pitfalls) as well as trying to get them to treat it with respect
(i.e. quit the vandalism).
Is there a place on Outreach where discussion of education/teaching
materials is happening?
Tom
On 1 June 2011 17:15, Alex Stinson <stinsoad(a)dukes.jmu.edu> wrote:
"High school professors." Yikes! Meant
teachers, not professors. I
thought I fixed that in a second read. Been working with universities for
too long.
Tom, that sounds like something that could really use some development in
the way of documented techniques or presenting the information. You may want
to check out the stuff on the Wikimedia Foundation bookshelf project for
materials you can destribute instead of making all of them yourself (
http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/Bookshelf). We also have been
developing a fair amount of stuff at the education portal on outreach,
though still a work in progress (
http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/Education). Alot has already been
developed in fairly professional ways, it just needs to be applied in the
class room,
Alex
On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 5:01 PM, Thomas Morton <
morton.thomas(a)googlemail.com> wrote:
Chris,
Yes, that was my impression too - I have some ideas/proposals to try and
bring into play but didn't want to step on top of an active project that I'd
missed :P
I'm based in Lincolnshire.
Alex,
I've been keeping a close eye on the Ambassadors project - it looks like
some great work (yet another reason to wish I was a student again :)).
Expanding that into schools is a major project, but one that I think would
net us some massive gains long term. I'd be really interested in hearing
about your work with the high school professors.
In general:
I've been interested in education for a while; I'm a scout leader here &
my parents have their own business doing educational visits to schools on
the topic of astronomy (so I have fairly extensive experience of that sort
of "business model"). The reason I have a specific interest now is that
I've
been approached to look at doing an evening class on computers and the
internet at a local secondary school. One of the topics I want to cover is
Wikipedia and WP editing.
I could put together some teaching material & release it for others to
use on an ad-hoc basis, but I think there is loads more we could expand into
if WMUK were behind it - stuff like working with the teaching bodies to get
WP recognised as a resource, and perhaps even worked into the curriculum (at
the very least work with them to provide useful material for
teachers/students about Wikipedia). In fact, something like the training
events Cancer Research people (but for teachers) would be really interesting
to explore.
Another off-hand idea; it would be great to try and team up with some of
the GLAM institutions to run educational days (i.e. have groups of kids turn
up to learn about stuff using local and Wikipedia content, and to get an
introduction to Wikipedia).
And more; we could use WMUK resources to train up and support Wikipedia
volunteers who want to go into the classroom - because teaching kids can be
damned hard!
There's a lot to focus on, but I think it is one of our most important
outreach areas in the UK.
Tom
On 1 June 2011 16:40, Chris Keating <chriskeatingwiki(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> I think it's been hibernating for a while. I haven't heard it mentioned
> at all since the new Board took office.
>
> Of course, if someone wants to pick up the ball and run with it, that
> would be very welcome. Whereabouts are you, Tom?
>
> Regards,
>
> Chris
>
> On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 10:51 AM, Thomas Morton <
> morton.thomas(a)googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hey all,
>>
>> What is the status of our work with schools/education?
>>
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Initiatives/Schools_project seems to be
>> a little stagnant, there are references to other School interactions on the
>> Wiki (including a link to a hidden office page about the educational
>> budget).
>>
>> Is any of this still active?
>>
>> I only ask because I've been approached locally to do some in-school
>> work relating to Wikipedia and it occurred to me that this is a major area
>> we could be focusing on.
>>
>> I've got a decent amount of experience working with children, schools
>> and educators and it would be great to contribute that on a wider scale.
>>
>> If none of those projects are particularly active, would anyone be
>> interested in working on this (including volunteering to go into schools and
>> youth groups)?
>>
>> Tom / ErrantX
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>> wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org
>>
http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>> WMUK:
http://uk.wikimedia.org
>>
>>
>
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>
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> WMUK:
http://uk.wikimedia.org
>
>
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