On Thu, 2010-01-07 at 01:21 +0000, Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/7 Bod Notbod bodnotbod@gmail.com:
On Wed, Jan 6, 2010 at 7:50 PM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
■ you can find a pre-checked Wikipedia collection of 5,500 articles targeted around the national curriculum at http://schools-wikipedia.org.
Wow! I've been volunteering on Wikipedia since 2004, during some periods very heavily, and I've never even heard of that!
I can't believe it has escaped my attention!
You should have been at the last Wikimedia UK AGM - one of the people responsible for Wikipedia for Schools gave a very interesting talk about it.
To see Wikipedia for Schools mentioned by the UK Government as a "recommended" educational resource is a delight to me. I interviewed a couple of the people involved when the 08/09 version came out:
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/2008-09_Wikipedia_for_Schools_goes_online
As is highlighted in the article, through working with wiki volunteers the charity was able to fill out key items on the national curriculum. The whole thing, and the way it is moving, gives me hope that future generations will be taught to be critical of sources that present themselves as an authority.
There is always the suspicion that those, such as the Telegraph, who might fear this change to a more critically thinking populace will dismiss and condemn it. Then again, I, personally, highly value critical thinking and a more long-term approach to issues and problems. I see the government accepting people will use Wikipedia, and cautioning them on how to judge an article, as a highly significant step forward in a process leading to a more informed and critical electorate.