Have you looked at working with the Wikipedia for Schools people?
I spoke to them back in 2008[1], but don't have current contacts.
[1]
It's an interesting idea. The colours on the main
page really stand
out, though I wonder how easy it will be for people with colour
blindness to read. Has it been tested for that?
On 19 February 2014 23:31, Mathias Damour <mathias.damour(a)laposte.net>
wrote:
Hi,
Since I was able and glad to come in EduWiki 2013 in Cardiff, to
make a presentation about the Wikikids proposal :
https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/EduWiki_Conference_2013/Abstracts#Wikikids_-_…
[1]
we have gone forward and we are about to launch Vikidia in English
on the 28th of February.
It's already open with restricted access, and the early editors
mainly come from the other Vikidias and from WikiKids.nl.
Nevertheless, I would be glad that Wikimedia UK or some of it's
member gets involved and supports this project, (Wikimedia France
does), provided that if it makes its way properly, it can have a
great impact for our goals.
If you want to have a look, it's
http://en.vikidia.org [2] and the
codes are "vikidia" and "aidikiv"
We have set up most of the basic/frame pages and we better them
before launching the wiki.
Here they are :
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:Talk/2014/8 [3]
Here is a scratch communiqué/launching message :
May you be interested in this project and spread, advice or help it
?
*****************************************************
A Vikidia opens today, let's built a children wiki encyclopedia in
English !
Vikidia is the equivalent of Wikipedia for children: an online
encyclopedic project, for 8-13 year-old readers, open to
contributors of any age. It was launched in November 2006 in French,
then in Spanish, Italian, Russian and now English. It aims both to
offer a suitable corpus of knowledge for children and to let some of
them, as well as teenagers them be involved in building it. It is
very close to Wikipedia in its aim and functioning, except the age
range.
Such wikis have proven their sustainability, relevance and success,
the two biggest ones this model being Vikidia in French and
WikiKids.nl in Dutch, with respectively 16000 and 14000 articles and
hundreds of thousand readers every month.
Many children already use Wikipedia daily, for the substantial
content and the well known convenient way it is to find material on
any subject. However, the level of Wikipedia articles makes them
hardly accessible for children or even other people on some subjects
and they may read it for lack of a better resource.
There is some television programs for children, some books, some
movies for children and even some newspapers and magazines. It would
be unsound to consider that they couldn't make a great use of a
children encyclopedia. Many children really need and appreciate when
it does exist to have a more readable content for them. They tell it
on the French Vikidia guestbook, on which the main remarks are that
they like it and that they would like to find more articles and more
content in most articles. It is not designed only for children but
for everybody who want a simple explanation on a subject. That mean
that the content must be suitable for 8-13 years old children, based
on the general perception of what is or not considered as possibly
offensive for this age range. That also mean that we take each
subject seriously in order to build a quality and substantial
documentary resource.
To offer to some children and teenagers to take part in such a
resource and to be active in the building process is also obviously
a matter of empowerment. The mere possibility to add something may
also change one child's motivation for the content as a reader.
Everybody is invited to edit Vikidia without age restrictions.
There are no mandatory or forbidden roles or status related to the
users real ages. Vikidia both needs grown-up contributions and
enable children and teenagers to write and to be involved in
building the encyclopedia. Young people can also be involved within
educational activities organised by schools. They may gain some
digital/media literacy by learning about the functioning of a
resource they will use extensively few years later: Wikipedia,
although the goal is still to create content an the "knowledge
resource" benefit of such a project: school projects are welcomed
provided they consider the wiki's rules and content objectives.
- Adults involvement is essential for building content that is of
quality and significance, fostering basic maintenance: to watch and
ensure a certain stability in the functioning of the wiki,
- children's involvement, even when they don't produce very long
articles, let appear works on subjects that interest their peers, it
responds to their aspirations and their desire to participate and
they definitely take their share in growing the content and in
maintenance tasks,
- older children, teenagers that don't (yet) edit Wikipedia can
have the chance to do it here, and to make a good work. The
advantage is both the amount of work they can bring, and what this
work can bring to them, like for the younger ones and like any
Wikipedia editor.
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:For_children_or_by_children%3F
[4]
Vikidia representatives used to work on a proposal to be adopted
within a multilingual Wikikids project. They no longer ask for it
and decided to remain it independent from the Wikimedia Foundation
and now to open a Vikidia in English.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikikids/Vikidia%27s_withdrawal_of_the_adop…
[5]
Vikidia is handled by the Association Vikidia, located in France, a
non-profit-organization. The servers are hosted by Tuxfamily, a
non-profit-organization that host free softwares and free content
projects.
Vikidia is free according to the principle of Free Knowledge. The
general license used is CC-BY-SA.
Vikidia especially implements and complies with the articles 12, 13
and 17 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:Relation_to_the_Rights_of_the_Child
[6]
--
Mathias Damour
49 rue Carnot
F-74000 Annecy
00 33 (0)4 57 09 10 56
00 33 (0)6 27 13 65 51
mathias.damour(a)laposte.net
http://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Utilisateur:Astirmays [7]
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http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l [8]
WMUK:
https://wikimedia.org.uk [9]
--
Richard Nevell
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 20 7065 0753
Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England
and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513.
Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street,
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global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the
Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects).
WIKIMEDIA UK IS AN INDEPENDENT NON-PROFIT CHARITY WITH NO LEGAL
CONTROL OVER WIKIPEDIA NOR RESPONSIBILITY FOR ITS CONTENTS.
Links:
------
[1]
https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/EduWiki_Conference_2013/Abstracts#Wikikids_-_…
[2]
http://en.vikidia.org
[3]
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:Talk/2014/8
[4]
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:For_children_or_by_children%3F
[5]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikikids/Vikidia%27s_withdrawal_of_the_adop…
[6]
http://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Vikidia:Relation_to_the_Rights_of_the_Child
[7]
http://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Utilisateur:Astirmays
[8]
http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
[9]
https://wikimedia.org.uk
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