http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6943325/Schoolchildren-told-to- avoid-Wikipedia.html
Perhaps Ofqual are the first people we should be aiming the schools project at, to teach them how to use Wikipedia properly so they can pass that guidance on?
Mike
Having said that, I've just looked at the original document:
http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf
It actually does a pretty good job at giving advice on how to use Wikipedia. It's just the Telegraph that chose the choice quote and ignored the advice. ;-)
It even mentions the School's Wikipedia.
Mike
On 6 Jan 2010, at 19:32, Michael Peel wrote:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6943325/Schoolchildren-told-to- avoid-Wikipedia.html
Perhaps Ofqual are the first people we should be aiming the schools project at, to teach them how to use Wikipedia properly so they can pass that guidance on?
Mike
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
2010/1/6 Michael Peel email@mikepeel.net:
Having said that, I've just looked at the original document:
http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf
It actually does a pretty good job at giving advice on how to use Wikipedia. It's just the Telegraph that chose the choice quote and ignored the advice. ;-)
It even mentions the School's Wikipedia.
It does a very good job, IMO. To save other people time, here is the relevant section:
"Using Wikipedia as a starting point ‘The free encyclopedia [sic] that anyone can edit.’ (Wikipedia, 2009) Wikipedia can be an excellent starting point for research. However, unlike traditional encyclopaedias anyone can add information on any topic, even you! It may not necessarily be authoritative or accurate. In some cases information may be completely untrue. You must always check the facts in a wiki article ■ check the reference list for the article. ■ carry out further research to find the referenced articles. ■ use the history and discussion pages accompanying an entry to help evaluate whether you can trust the information. ■ you can find a pre-checked Wikipedia collection of 5,500 articles targeted around the national curriculum at http://schools-wikipedia.org. ■ never use Wikipedia as your only source."
I couldn't have put it better myself.
We should issue a statement supporting the Ofqual report and correcting the Telegraph article:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
We should issue a statement supporting the Ofqual report and correcting the Telegraph article:
See the "Wikipedia guide for teachers" thread from 6 December for some online refs I gave for article evaluation. Rebutting what the Telegraph said is probably a cul-de-sac: the Telegraph isn't going to print it, and other papers have no reason to write about the Telegraph rather than some expert source.
So I'd suggest developing a press release along the lines of amplifying the good points in what Ofqual said, taking it as an endorsement of "always read the label" type. Needs work, though. What is the story we are putting across? Roughly, there is the "riff" that school students will use the Web, like it or not; and so knowing how to use WP properly is a research skill of our time, just as is using a search engine.
Charles
2010/1/6 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
We should issue a statement supporting the Ofqual report and correcting the Telegraph article:
See the "Wikipedia guide for teachers" thread from 6 December for some online refs I gave for article evaluation. Rebutting what the Telegraph said is probably a cul-de-sac: the Telegraph isn't going to print it, and other papers have no reason to write about the Telegraph rather than some expert source.
So I'd suggest developing a press release along the lines of amplifying the good points in what Ofqual said, taking it as an endorsement of "always read the label" type. Needs work, though. What is the story we are putting across? Roughly, there is the "riff" that school students will use the Web, like it or not; and so knowing how to use WP properly is a research skill of our time, just as is using a search engine.
I agree - my first draft starts off talking about how we support the Ofqual guidance and just mentions the Telegraph at the end. The former part should be expanded. The Ofqual issuing this guidance is newsworthy, as evidenced by the Telegraph writing about it, so we should be mostly talking about that. Please add your "riff" to the press release.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
I agree - my first draft starts off talking about how we support the Ofqual guidance and just mentions the Telegraph at the end. The former part should be expanded. The Ofqual issuing this guidance is newsworthy, as evidenced by the Telegraph writing about it, so we should be mostly talking about that. Please add your "riff" to the press release.
Isn't this the topical moment to announce, though, that WMUK will be posting/has posted on its own wiki a concise but expert-written guide on how Wikipedia should be used? Amplifying what Ofqual said, and useful alike to teachers and students. We would of course have to write such a thing, but that's a matter of cutting GFDL text to length really. (Err, the site says nothing about GFDL right now.)
Not to complicate the issue, but basically Ofqual have it right, so this is a good time to get the attention of the teaching profession with our message. Think perhaps in terms of aiming at the Times Educational Supplement. What would they likely print about this?
Charles
2010/1/6 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
I agree - my first draft starts off talking about how we support the Ofqual guidance and just mentions the Telegraph at the end. The former part should be expanded. The Ofqual issuing this guidance is newsworthy, as evidenced by the Telegraph writing about it, so we should be mostly talking about that. Please add your "riff" to the press release.
Isn't this the topical moment to announce, though, that WMUK will be posting/has posted on its own wiki a concise but expert-written guide on how Wikipedia should be used? Amplifying what Ofqual said, and useful alike to teachers and students. We would of course have to write such a thing, but that's a matter of cutting GFDL text to length really. (Err, the site says nothing about GFDL right now.)
My draft includes a link to such a guide on Wikipedia - do we need to write another one?
Not to complicate the issue, but basically Ofqual have it right, so this is a good time to get the attention of the teaching profession with our message. Think perhaps in terms of aiming at the Times Educational Supplement. What would they likely print about this?
Sending the release to the TES would make sense. I don't think we need anything different for TES than other press - this is a story about education, so they should be interested in it.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
My draft includes a link to such a guide on Wikipedia - do we need to write another one?
Yes, to address the British teaching profession [[Wikipedia:Researching with Wikipedia]] isn't really the concise guide that is needed. It looks like a bunch of generalities addressed to American college students, frankly. (Like much else on Wikipedia, hah. For reasons that are not hard to understand.)
Imagine you're a teacher of a class of sixteen-year-olds, and you're leaning over the shoulder of one of them looking at a WP article. Your job is to tell them to click here/scroll there/read the tags at the top/observe that this section has no footnotes, to some effect, so that the student has a better idea of how to assess what they're looking at.
Charles
2010/1/6 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
My draft includes a link to such a guide on Wikipedia - do we need to write another one?
Yes, to address the British teaching profession [[Wikipedia:Researching with Wikipedia]] isn't really the concise guide that is needed. It looks like a bunch of generalities addressed to American college students, frankly. (Like much else on Wikipedia, hah. For reasons that are not hard to understand.)
Imagine you're a teacher of a class of sixteen-year-olds, and you're leaning over the shoulder of one of them looking at a WP article. Your job is to tell them to click here/scroll there/read the tags at the top/observe that this section has no footnotes, to some effect, so that the student has a better idea of how to assess what they're looking at.
Ok, fair enough. We will be producing those kind of materials for the schools project anyway, so we can easily make them available online (and probably would anyway - it's just a matter of publicising it).
It might be worth mentioning simple.wikipedia.org?
2010/1/6 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
My draft includes a link to such a guide on Wikipedia - do we need to write another one?
Yes, to address the British teaching profession [[Wikipedia:Researching with Wikipedia]] isn't really the concise guide that is needed. It looks like a bunch of generalities addressed to American college students, frankly. (Like much else on Wikipedia, hah. For reasons that are not hard to understand.)
Imagine you're a teacher of a class of sixteen-year-olds, and you're leaning over the shoulder of one of them looking at a WP article. Your job is to tell them to click here/scroll there/read the tags at the top/observe that this section has no footnotes, to some effect, so that the student has a better idea of how to assess what they're looking at.
Ok, fair enough. We will be producing those kind of materials for the schools project anyway, so we can easily make them available online (and probably would anyway - it's just a matter of publicising it).
_______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
2010/1/7 Douglas Gardner microchip08@btinternet.com:
It might be worth mentioning simple.wikipedia.org?
Probably not. Simple is good for people just learning English (either non-native speakers or young children) and I don't think the Ofqual guidance is really aimed at them. We should keep an eye out for opportunities to mention it, though - I used to be an admin there (desysopped due to inactivity), so I recognise the value of the project.
Charles Matthews wrote:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
We should issue a statement supporting the Ofqual report and correcting the Telegraph article:
See the "Wikipedia guide for teachers" thread from 6 December for some online refs I gave for article evaluation. Rebutting what the Telegraph said is probably a cul-de-sac: the Telegraph isn't going to print it, and other papers have no reason to write about the Telegraph rather than some expert source.
So I'd suggest developing a press release along the lines of amplifying the good points in what Ofqual said, taking it as an endorsement of "always read the label" type. Needs work, though. What is the story we are putting across? Roughly, there is the "riff" that school students will use the Web, like it or not; and so knowing how to use WP properly is a research skill of our time, just as is using a search engine.
Charles
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
I always describe Wikipedia as an "advanced Google". While Google gathers together sources that match your search term, Wikipedia weeds out the facts you are most likely to want, summarises them, and gives you a link to the source. It generally helps people to get the gist.
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!
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.
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.
2010/1/7 Brian McNeil brian.mcneil@wikinewsie.org:
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.
I think the telegraph having published a positive wikipedia story see no reason not to then publish a negative one.
Michael Peel wrote:
Having said that, I've just looked at the original document:
http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf
It actually does a pretty good job at giving advice on how to use Wikipedia. It's just the Telegraph that chose the choice quote and ignored the advice. ;-)
It even mentions the School's Wikipedia.
OK, I'm trying now to draft a press release by shoehorning it into the "six sentence" format. This seems to work well enough as a way of seeing what the "story" is.
Draft:
School students spend an increasing proportion of their free time online, and will not be deterred from spending study time on the Web also. Now Ofqual, the UK’s official examination regulation body, has endorsed a guide “Using Sources” that is designed to help students using the Web avoid the hazards, such as plagiarism and unreliable information, by making proper use of sites such as Wikipedia, which produces schools-wikipedia.org and DVD selections especially for this educational sector.
Wikimedia UK, the national organization representing the Wikipedia reference site and other online resources, has responded by producing a concise online document aimed at secondary school teachers. Mike Peel, chair of WMUK, said “For all the adverse media comment and robust debate, it is really important that students using Wikipedia understand the correct way to work with this resource, and teachers can help them to a more informed and critical way of using a site that they will all know about and read anyway.”
The new guide is based on understanding how to look over a Wikipedia page, examine warning notices and references, and follow up clues in the history and discussion of a particular article. It is free content, released under the GFDL license used for Wikipedia.
/draft
This isn't perfect, clearly. But is this on-message? Would this be what WMUK wanted to say at this time? (NB that Ofqual did not write the guide itself, but endorses what plagiarismadvice.org wrote.)
Charles
Perhaps a quick note about Special:Cite?
...said... ==> ...stated..?
-----Original Message-----
Michael Peel wrote:
Having said that, I've just looked at the original document:
http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf
It actually does a pretty good job at giving advice on how to use Wikipedia. It's just the Telegraph that chose the choice quote and ignored the advice. ;-)
It even mentions the School's Wikipedia.
OK, I'm trying now to draft a press release by shoehorning it into the "six sentence" format. This seems to work well enough as a way of seeing what the "story" is.
Draft:
School students spend an increasing proportion of their free time online, and will not be deterred from spending study time on the Web also. Now Ofqual, the UK's official examination regulation body, has endorsed a guide "Using Sources" that is designed to help students using the Web avoid the hazards, such as plagiarism and unreliable information, by making proper use of sites such as Wikipedia, which produces schools-wikipedia.org and DVD selections especially for this educational sector.
Wikimedia UK, the national organization representing the Wikipedia reference site and other online resources, has responded by producing a concise online document aimed at secondary school teachers. Mike Peel, chair of WMUK, said "For all the adverse media comment and robust debate, it is really important that students using Wikipedia understand the correct way to work with this resource, and teachers can help them to a more informed and critical way of using a site that they will all know about and read anyway."
The new guide is based on understanding how to look over a Wikipedia page, examine warning notices and references, and follow up clues in the history and discussion of a particular article. It is free content, released under the GFDL license used for Wikipedia.
/draft
This isn't perfect, clearly. But is this on-message? Would this be what WMUK wanted to say at this time? (NB that Ofqual did not write the guide itself, but endorses what plagiarismadvice.org wrote.)
Charles
_______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
Guys
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release. Feel free to wrap any or all your very valid points below inside and around the idea/goal of the project, should you agree with me.
To refresh: the Board has been looking for opportunities to 'work with teachers' or 'trainers' or 'academics' to help them see the advantages of Wikipedia in terms of use with students. This could be in terms of collaborative research projects that can put these skills into practice. In could be in terms of helping teachers or trainers build additional skills in the groups they train. The bigger objective is to lead to new volunteers for Wikpedia and new content.
This is the real 'prize' here. I am working on something along these lines in Bristol with the Bristol Old Vic Theatre ready to work closely with schools and colleges in the area and probably up for handing over lots of content (when copyright free licences can be sorted out correctly). I am also working on trying to get into some local schools to get the Schools project outlined above rolling - I have one school very interested and hope to have a date for a session in the not too distant future.
So my point is... don't bury this message in this more peripheral point - link it back to what I describe below. There is more substance to a press statement if we are not only making a statement about something but ALSO trying to actively do something about it as well. We must not simply sound off on issues 'as and when' they pop up as we would not have people listening to us when it really counts and we need the press to publish it.
Happy to help 'team up' with anyone and everyone in drafting anything - just mail me
Best to al
Steve
-------------------------------------------------- From: "Douglas Gardner" microchip08@btinternet.com Sent: Thursday, January 07, 2010 12:09 PM To: charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com; wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told to avoidWikipedia" -Telegraph> Perhaps a quick note about Special:Cite?
...said... ==> ...stated..?
-----Original Message-----
Michael Peel wrote:
Having said that, I've just looked at the original document:
http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf
It actually does a pretty good job at giving advice on how to use Wikipedia. It's just the Telegraph that chose the choice quote and ignored the advice. ;-)
It even mentions the School's Wikipedia.
OK, I'm trying now to draft a press release by shoehorning it into the "six sentence" format. This seems to work well enough as a way of seeing what the "story" is.
Draft:
School students spend an increasing proportion of their free time online, and will not be deterred from spending study time on the Web also. Now Ofqual, the UK's official examination regulation body, has endorsed a guide "Using Sources" that is designed to help students using the Web avoid the hazards, such as plagiarism and unreliable information, by making proper use of sites such as Wikipedia, which produces schools-wikipedia.org and DVD selections especially for this educational sector.
Wikimedia UK, the national organization representing the Wikipedia reference site and other online resources, has responded by producing a concise online document aimed at secondary school teachers. Mike Peel, chair of WMUK, said "For all the adverse media comment and robust debate, it is really important that students using Wikipedia understand the correct way to work with this resource, and teachers can help them to a more informed and critical way of using a site that they will all know about and read anyway."
The new guide is based on understanding how to look over a Wikipedia page, examine warning notices and references, and follow up clues in the history and discussion of a particular article. It is free content, released under the GFDL license used for Wikipedia.
/draft
This isn't perfect, clearly. But is this on-message? Would this be what WMUK wanted to say at this time? (NB that Ofqual did not write the guide itself, but endorses what plagiarismadvice.org wrote.)
Charles
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
Steve Virgin wrote:
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release. Feel free to wrap any or all your very valid points below inside and around the idea/goal of the project, should you agree with me.
To refresh: the Board has been looking for opportunities to 'work with teachers' or 'trainers' or 'academics' to help them see the advantages of Wikipedia in terms of use with students. This could be in terms of collaborative research projects that can put these skills into practice. In could be in terms of helping teachers or trainers build additional skills in the groups they train. The bigger objective is to lead to new volunteers for Wikpedia and new content.
I suggested writing a concise guide for teachers and posting it on the WMUK site for two reasons, firstly because the point had been raised on this list in December, and secondly because I know how to get that written, having done a book chapter on this in 2007. If there is a need to integrate with other work, by all means put forward a way to fit it all together. I'm sure it is right to 'migrate' the message from a rebuttal of what journalists have to say, to our own ground. I see no inconsistency here, in fact, just a discussion of ways and means.
Charles
I could not agree more.
:-)
-------------------------------------------------- From: "Charles Matthews" charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com Sent: Thursday, January 07, 2010 12:57 PM To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told toavoidWikipedia" -Telegraph> Steve Virgin wrote:
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release. Feel free to wrap any or all your very valid points below inside and around the idea/goal of the project, should you agree with me.
To refresh: the Board has been looking for opportunities to 'work with teachers' or 'trainers' or 'academics' to help them see the advantages of Wikipedia in terms of use with students. This could be in terms of collaborative research projects that can put these skills into practice. In could be in terms of helping teachers or trainers build additional skills in the groups they train. The bigger objective is to lead to new volunteers for Wikpedia and new content.
I suggested writing a concise guide for teachers and posting it on the WMUK site for two reasons, firstly because the point had been raised on this list in December, and secondly because I know how to get that written, having done a book chapter on this in 2007. If there is a need to integrate with other work, by all means put forward a way to fit it all together. I'm sure it is right to 'migrate' the message from a rebuttal of what journalists have to say, to our own ground. I see no inconsistency here, in fact, just a discussion of ways and means.
Charles
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
On Thu, 2010-01-07 at 13:10 +0000, Steve Virgin wrote:
I could not agree more.
Whoever wrote the guidelines for the government is a smart cookie. There is that clear implication that learning how to judge the credibility of any piece of information presented to you is a valuable skill.
At issue is when it might be appropriate for schoolkids to start using the "adult" Wikipedia. No teacher can prevent them doing so outside school, so a locked and vetted version appropriate to the curriculum is the best way to start understanding the significance of whatever a search engine will throw at you.
I'd be happy to help draft a guide on use of Wikipedia by schools if someone starts it. The one on Wikipedia isn't really appropriate for kids of 12 or under. It's also not focussed enough to be quickly useful to educators - it shouldn't just be a case of telling people to question the veracity of an article on Wikipedia but, to question any story you dig up via the Internet.
From: "Charles Matthews" charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com Sent: Thursday, January 07, 2010 12:57 PM To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told toavoidWikipedia" -Telegraph> Steve Virgin wrote:
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release. Feel free to wrap any or all your very valid points below inside and around the idea/goal of the project, should you agree with me.
To refresh: the Board has been looking for opportunities to 'work with teachers' or 'trainers' or 'academics' to help them see the advantages of Wikipedia in terms of use with students. This could be in terms of collaborative research projects that can put these skills into practice. In could be in terms of helping teachers or trainers build additional skills in the groups they train. The bigger objective is to lead to new volunteers for Wikpedia and new content.
I suggested writing a concise guide for teachers and posting it on the WMUK site for two reasons, firstly because the point had been raised on this list in December, and secondly because I know how to get that written, having done a book chapter on this in 2007. If there is a need to integrate with other work, by all means put forward a way to fit it all together. I'm sure it is right to 'migrate' the message from a rebuttal of what journalists have to say, to our own ground. I see no inconsistency here, in fact, just a discussion of ways and means.
Charles
Brian McNeil wrote:
I'd be happy to help draft a guide on use of Wikipedia by schools if someone starts it. The one on Wikipedia isn't really appropriate for kids of 12 or under. It's also not focussed enough to be quickly useful to educators - it shouldn't just be a case of telling people to question the veracity of an article on Wikipedia but, to question any story you dig up via the Internet.
I've started a draft at [[Guide for Teachers (Draft)]] on the WMUK wiki, so that we can get into concrete details. I basically agree with the point on critical thinking, and have put it in the Preamble there. But the real meat is in pointing to skills that allow you to be your own critic of what you read online. WP is quite a good place to start, in fact.
Charles
2010/1/7 Steve Virgin steve@mediafocusuk.com:
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release.
I don't disagree that this is an opportunity to mention our project, but I don't think it should be the heart of the release. Our PR work should be more than just about promoting our own stuff. It should also be a way of directly promoting and educating people about the Wikimedia projects and the concept of free content. We should be issuing press releases about subjects relevant to Wikimedia even if they have nothing to do with anything Wikimedia UK is doing.
The Times Educational Supplement contacted WMUK today about the ofqual guidance, with an urgent deadline to meet (2.30pm). I explained to them that the information they provide is good, and that Wikipedia is a great starting point, and a stepping stone to learning more (emphasising the references at the bottom of the articles, etc.). I also commented (hopefully not in a way that will get quoted...) that I don't know where the Telegraph and Mail got their headlines from.
I also talked a little about the Schools Project, saying that we want to help teach students how to use WIkipedia properly, and provide guidance for teachers too. Hopefully that will get some sort of mention in the article. I also pointed them towards the website, although looking again at it we don't seem to have much useful information on there at the moment about the schools project, so that's probably a missed opportunity. :-(
I believe the TES is published weekly, on a Friday, so I don't know whether this would have been for today's issue (unlikely) or next week's (more likely).
Mike
On 7 Jan 2010, at 17:16, Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/7 Steve Virgin steve@mediafocusuk.com:
As a Board member I personally believe we should be attempting to promote our Schools Project here and that should sit at the heart of any release.
I don't disagree that this is an opportunity to mention our project, but I don't think it should be the heart of the release. Our PR work should be more than just about promoting our own stuff. It should also be a way of directly promoting and educating people about the Wikimedia projects and the concept of free content. We should be issuing press releases about subjects relevant to Wikimedia even if they have nothing to do with anything Wikimedia UK is doing.
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
It's about social media and education, which is an interesting topic in itself, but most importantly it contains this line:
"Wikis are web pages that can be easily edited, the most famous of which is Wikipedia, the world's largest encyclopedia."
A journalist knows the difference between "wiki" and "Wikipedia" - joy of joys! (The downside is that it suggests schools improve/create an article about their school as an example, which is something of a COI...)
Also, did anyone send a link to this article (from Nov 2009) to this list? http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6028137 The headline: "Wikipedia is good for pupils and teachers". You know what? I think I like TES more than the Telegraph!
No sign of an article about the Ofqual guidance on their website yet, though.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
It's about social media and education, which is an interesting topic in itself, but most importantly it contains this line:
"Wikis are web pages that can be easily edited, the most famous of which is Wikipedia, the world's largest encyclopedia."
A journalist knows the difference between "wiki" and "Wikipedia" - joy of joys! (The downside is that it suggests schools improve/create an article about their school as an example, which is something of a COI...)
The next para is pretty interesting:
"When Tom Rae took over as the head of Tynecastle High School in Edinburgh, he noticed the school's Wikipedia entry was outdated and short on hard facts. As he was not sure how to update it, he set his senior students the task of doing it. In just under a week, a group of more than 10 students had researched and rewritten it. They became the first Tynecastle students to be published in Wikipedia. How empowering is that?"
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Charles
Another thought
Is the WMFoundation putting out a press release saying 'thanks' to the thousands of donors who have helped it to hit its global fund raising targets?
If it isn't, shouldn't we be doing it?
-------------------------------------------------- From: "Charles Matthews" charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com Sent: Saturday, January 09, 2010 11:09 AM To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told to avoidWikipedia"-Telegraph> Thomas Dalton wrote:
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
It's about social media and education, which is an interesting topic in itself, but most importantly it contains this line:
"Wikis are web pages that can be easily edited, the most famous of which is Wikipedia, the world's largest encyclopedia."
A journalist knows the difference between "wiki" and "Wikipedia" - joy of joys! (The downside is that it suggests schools improve/create an article about their school as an example, which is something of a COI...)
The next para is pretty interesting:
"When Tom Rae took over as the head of Tynecastle High School in Edinburgh, he noticed the school's Wikipedia entry was outdated and short on hard facts. As he was not sure how to update it, he set his senior students the task of doing it. In just under a week, a group of more than 10 students had researched and rewritten it. They became the first Tynecastle students to be published in Wikipedia. How empowering is that?"
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Charles
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
http://uk.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Press_releases/Wikimedia_Fundraise r_ends&action=edit&redlink=1 awaits!
-----Original Message----- From: wikimediauk-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimediauk-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Steve Virgin Sent: 09 January 2010 11:43 AM To: charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com; wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told to avoidWikipedia"- Telegraph
Another thought
Is the WMFoundation putting out a press release saying 'thanks' to the thousands of donors who have helped it to hit its global fund raising targets?
If it isn't, shouldn't we be doing it?
-------------------------------------------------- From: "Charles Matthews" charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com Sent: Saturday, January 09, 2010 11:09 AM To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] "Schoolchildren told to avoidWikipedia"-Telegraph> Thomas Dalton wrote:
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
It's about social media and education, which is an interesting topic in itself, but most importantly it contains this line:
"Wikis are web pages that can be easily edited, the most famous of which is Wikipedia, the world's largest encyclopedia."
A journalist knows the difference between "wiki" and "Wikipedia" - joy of joys! (The downside is that it suggests schools improve/create an article about their school as an example, which is something of a COI...)
The next para is pretty interesting:
"When Tom Rae took over as the head of Tynecastle High School in Edinburgh, he noticed the school's Wikipedia entry was outdated and short on hard facts. As he was not sure how to update it, he set his senior students the task of doing it. In just under a week, a group of more than 10 students had researched and rewritten it. They became the first Tynecastle students to be published in Wikipedia. How empowering is that?"
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Charles
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
_______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
2010/1/9 Steve Virgin steve@mediafocusuk.com:
Another thought
Is the WMFoundation putting out a press release saying 'thanks' to the thousands of donors who have helped it to hit its global fund raising targets?
If it isn't, shouldn't we be doing it?
I'm not sure about a press release. The WMF will be emailing donors to thank them, as will I. A press release might be good in addition to that.
On Sat, Jan 9, 2010 at 11:42 AM, Steve Virgin steve@mediafocusuk.com wrote:
Another thought
Is the WMFoundation putting out a press release saying 'thanks' to the thousands of donors who have helped it to hit its global fund raising targets?
Well, there's a massive banner on Wikipedia saying "thanks". I would think that about covers it.
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
---- Chris McKenna
cmckenna@sucs.org www.sucs.org/~cmckenna
The essential things in life are seen not with the eyes, but with the heart
Antoine de Saint Exupery
2010/1/9 Chris McKenna cmckenna@sucs.org:
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
Yes, that's the usual recommendation. I'm not sure what you mean by the school having control of them, though.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/9 Chris McKenna cmckenna@sucs.org:
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
Yes, that's the usual recommendation. I'm not sure what you mean by the school having control of them, though.
In the scenario of the school in Edinburgh, a group is told to execute a certain project on WP. The attraction of a single account is clear from the point of view of monitoring: a single edit history tells you everything. If you have a group editing one page - and I have met just this on WP, American college students assigned a task of upgrading a nominated page - a bunch of people all trying to edit from different accounts can lead to edit conflicts, if no worse.
Any account where the email address supplied went to a computer in the school's administration would be "controlled" by the school, from the point of view of resetting the password.
This discussion seems like fine tuning to me, actually; but, yes, I can see it might be worth going into the issues a little in a guide. (I do want to be concise, though ... all experience suggests verbose is easier to write and less likely to be read.)
Charles
2010/1/9 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/9 Chris McKenna cmckenna@sucs.org:
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
Yes, that's the usual recommendation. I'm not sure what you mean by the school having control of them, though.
In the scenario of the school in Edinburgh, a group is told to execute a certain project on WP. The attraction of a single account is clear from the point of view of monitoring: a single edit history tells you everything. If you have a group editing one page - and I have met just this on WP, American college students assigned a task of upgrading a nominated page - a bunch of people all trying to edit from different accounts can lead to edit conflicts, if no worse.
Any account where the email address supplied went to a computer in the school's administration would be "controlled" by the school, from the point of view of resetting the password.
This discussion seems like fine tuning to me, actually; but, yes, I can see it might be worth going into the issues a little in a guide. (I do want to be concise, though ... all experience suggests verbose is easier to write and less likely to be read.)
Charles
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
On Sat, 2010-01-09 at 21:14 +0000, geni wrote:
2010/1/9 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/9 Chris McKenna cmckenna@sucs.org:
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
Yes, that's the usual recommendation. I'm not sure what you mean by the school having control of them, though.
In the scenario of the school in Edinburgh, a group is told to execute a certain project on WP. The attraction of a single account is clear from the point of view of monitoring: a single edit history tells you everything. If you have a group editing one page - and I have met just this on WP, American college students assigned a task of upgrading a nominated page - a bunch of people all trying to edit from different accounts can lead to edit conflicts, if no worse.
Any account where the email address supplied went to a computer in the school's administration would be "controlled" by the school, from the point of view of resetting the password.
This discussion seems like fine tuning to me, actually; but, yes, I can see it might be worth going into the issues a little in a guide. (I do want to be concise, though ... all experience suggests verbose is easier to write and less likely to be read.)
Charles
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
Speaking as someone with the CheckUser privilege (on enWN, not enWP), you want individual students to have individual accounts. Use of CheckUser will reveal their edits as coming from a school IP address - and they likely will edit from home too.
Someone official, such as a teacher, contacting the schools and university projects people is a really good idea too.
As a worst-case the school IP can be blocked from anonymous edits and the creation of accounts.
If the school's staff deal with either telling the pupils what user accounts to create, or finding out which they've chosen, no information about minors' identities is shared online. If a pupil is blocked then real-world implications only come into effect if a member of school staff becomes aware of it.
Of course, there are two separate issues here now. The first, use of Wikipedia as a resource; the second, actual contribution to Wikipedia.
To people on this list, and Wikimedians in general, the two are intimately intertwined. Jon Beasley-Murray makes the best case for actually contributing to learn about Wikipedia:
Overall, a Wikipedia assignment offered lots of possibilities, including: * teaching students about Wikipedia, an important site that they use (and too often misuse) * improving Wikipedia itself, by generating new content on topics where its coverage is lacking * encouraging students to produce something that had relevance outside the classroom, in the public sphere * giving them tangible goals that were measured by something other than my own professorial judgement * changing their views about writing, by stressing the importance of ongoing revision * teaching them about research and about how to use and evaluate sources
His response (this is a University professor) to the "using Wikipedia" question is,
"If a Wikipedia article is a good one, then you won't need to quote it, as it will have links to all the relevant sources. And if it doesn't have those links, then it isn't a good article, and shouldn't be quoted in any case.
Before this semester, I explicitly banned students from quoting Wikipedia articles in their essays. And I will continue to do so. I also look askance at them citing dictionary definitions. And though they don't quote Britannica (I think Wikipedia has now for all intents and purposes replaced Britannica), I would likewise be unimpressed if they were to do so. On the other hand, of course, as you say, Wikipedia can be an excellent starting point for research. I personally use it often precisely for that reason."
[Full interview: http://enwn.net/bbC8]
Now, that's in tertiary education. It was the creation of articles on Latin-American literature.
What, exactly, would stop an A-level class from trying to bring an article on their school or a notable local building or location up to Good Article status?
I'm over 22 years past the Scottish secondary education system; there was no Internet in schools then, and the few computers were a novelty that pupils knew more about than teachers. [I was one of the pupils that basically ran our school's BBC Micro lab because the teacher was a mathematician.]
So, the question really has to be *where* does this fit within the national curriculum and it's devolved counterparts? Are there any honest-to-goodness teachers in WMUK? Can we recruit some?
The WMUK wiki is a great place to put together some sort of teachers' guide - but it needs input from real teachers who know the curriculum. They can set out lesson plan frameworks. It could be improving students' English by improving existing articles; delving into local history (with the availability of local newspaper and library archives); or some other possibility I haven't thought of.
Perhaps what's needed isn't a press release to counter the Telegraph's negative coverage but, for WMUK members to actually approach their own secondary schools, highlight the guidelines and a few choice quotes, and try to help them join the 'cult-of-wiki' ;-)
Mostly this would be Wikipedians; Commoners could do so in relation to "Wikipedia Loves Art".
With my focus predominantly on Wikinews I'm watching with interest as what appears to be an Illinois highschool student, without visible school staff support, teaching himself to be a sports journalist by covering local inter-school sports tournaments. There is, honestly, nothing to stop pupils putting together a school newspaper submitting some work to Wikinews.
There are a range of projects under the WMF banner. There's no way I could do a Wikipedia Academy because that's not my project. In all honesty, I only call myself a Wikimedian on the basis of having learned enough to legally and correctly upload content to Commons and tag, copyedit, or change Wikipedia articles without violating policy.
This ended up longer than I expected; could a strategy of grassroots work, with 'learning experience' errors, be a better use of resources than countering UK mainstream media reportage?
On 9 Jan 2010, at 21:14, geni wrote:
2010/1/9 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/9 Chris McKenna cmckenna@sucs.org:
On Sat, 9 Jan 2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
The point (for the guide that Brian and I are apparently writing) is that "empowerment" is a good buzzword, but there is a small, treacherous area to explore from a teachers' point of view: accounts for minors should not give personal details, so a "role account" for say, Tynecastle High School, looks more appropriate. But there are administrative reefs also, namely the deprecation of role accounts and shared passwords in general. Something can be done in practical terms by stating that the project has a fixed term, will be retired, and will have its password changed by a school staff member.
Would not it be perhaps better for the individual students to have accounts, but under teh control of the school. Perhaps based on their school pupil number (e.g. Tynecastle-091 Tynecastle-122) which means that attribution for good and bad edits could be given to the individual rather than the school.
Yes, that's the usual recommendation. I'm not sure what you mean by the school having control of them, though.
In the scenario of the school in Edinburgh, a group is told to execute a certain project on WP. The attraction of a single account is clear from the point of view of monitoring: a single edit history tells you everything. If you have a group editing one page - and I have met just this on WP, American college students assigned a task of upgrading a nominated page - a bunch of people all trying to edit from different accounts can lead to edit conflicts, if no worse.
Any account where the email address supplied went to a computer in the school's administration would be "controlled" by the school, from the point of view of resetting the password.
This discussion seems like fine tuning to me, actually; but, yes, I can see it might be worth going into the issues a little in a guide. (I do want to be concise, though ... all experience suggests verbose is easier to write and less likely to be read.)
Charles
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first. -- geni
On the narrow point of whether schools or pupils should have accounts, I have come across a similar issue at work. We provide a web service with some similarities to WP, and we started off with company accounts. For security (and accountability) reasons, we moved to giving each individual a user name which can be given access to any number of accounts. The incentive for a business is that they can add or "ban" users from their own accounts without having to go through us (ie they can administer their own users); and also they can monitor usage by each user of their own account, which is a big incentive to do it our way and not to share user names in business.
Providing some incentive for people to do it the WP way - which basically could be a similar combination of information and control - is a good way to get schools to do it your way.
As it happens, our web service is available to all UK schools at no charge to them (paid for by a charity), so I suppose it has a parallel existence.
geni wrote:
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
I don't want to pull rank on this (much), but I have been through ArbCom discussions of "role accounts". There was some merit in what I was suggesting, namely single account with email to someone responsible. If you want, I can run some wording for the User page past ArbCom members, and see if any suggested "protocols" are sensible. I would have thought admins would have better things to do than close down such an account for technical infractions - bad behaviour would be another matter.
The supposed forum is [[Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classroom coordination]], which doesn't appear that active. I think you should take notice that projects involving minors (which covers most students in secondary schools) are not necessarily in the same position as those generally listed at [[Wikipedia:School and university projects]], which seem almost entirely to be at college level.
Charles
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
geni wrote:
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
I don't want to pull rank on this (much), but I have been through ArbCom discussions of "role accounts". There was some merit in what I was suggesting, namely single account with email to someone responsible. If you want, I can run some wording for the User page past ArbCom members, and see if any suggested "protocols" are sensible. I would have thought admins would have better things to do than close down such an account for technical infractions - bad behaviour would be another matter.
Arbcom don't make policy.
Role accounts just look wrong to people who watch such things and a series of same name plus number accounts have been known to make admins paranoid.
This is not an area I feel our general run of admins are very good at dealing with. For one example of things going wrong see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Inciden...
The supposed forum is [[Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classroom coordination]], which doesn't appear that active. I think you should take notice that projects involving minors (which covers most students in secondary schools) are not necessarily in the same position as those generally listed at [[Wikipedia:School and university projects]], which seem almost entirely to be at college level.
Charles
Wikipedia:School and university projects is active and at least means there is a fair chance projects can be given a once over and supported by people who understand wikipedia and such projects to at least some degree.
2010/1/10 geni geniice@gmail.com:
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
geni wrote:
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
I don't want to pull rank on this (much), but I have been through ArbCom discussions of "role accounts". There was some merit in what I was suggesting, namely single account with email to someone responsible. If you want, I can run some wording for the User page past ArbCom members, and see if any suggested "protocols" are sensible. I would have thought admins would have better things to do than close down such an account for technical infractions - bad behaviour would be another matter.
Arbcom don't make policy.
Precisely. The last time the community discussed role accounts the consensus was against them. Until such time as a different community consensus is established, that is the policy and ArbCom are obliged to enforce it.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/10 geni geniice@gmail.com:
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
geni wrote:
Well so far everything you have described would risk getting you blocked from wikipedia.
Probably the most important thing to do is to contact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects first.
I don't want to pull rank on this (much), but I have been through ArbCom discussions of "role accounts". There was some merit in what I was suggesting, namely single account with email to someone responsible. If you want, I can run some wording for the User page past ArbCom members, and see if any suggested "protocols" are sensible. I would have thought admins would have better things to do than close down such an account for technical infractions - bad behaviour would be another matter.
Arbcom don't make policy.
Precisely. The last time the community discussed role accounts the consensus was against them. Until such time as a different community consensus is established, that is the policy and ArbCom are obliged to enforce it.
Shrug. Admins are never "obliged" to enforce policy if it gives a stupid result. ArbCom are "obliged" to make some sense out of what the policy pages say, bearing in mind the good of the mission. Asking for 1500 admins to come up with a consensus position is fairly futile. Asking an Arbitrator is consulting an informed person. I know what I'd think of an admin who blocked a school project on this technicality. i'll concede that what is recommended should be well thought through, but my feeling is that this could lead to second-best advice being given.
If anyone would like to point to pages on enWP that actually say the practical things teachers in a secondary school should know about this issue, rather than waffling on about how everyone one will benefit if American college students edit Wikipedia (which in my limited experience they do with a role account), be my guest.
Charles
Charles
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Shrug. Admins are never "obliged" to enforce policy if it gives a stupid result. ArbCom are "obliged" to make some sense out of what the policy pages say, bearing in mind the good of the mission. Asking for 1500 admins to come up with a consensus position is fairly futile. Asking an Arbitrator is consulting an informed person. I know what I'd think of an admin who blocked a school project on this technicality. i'll concede that what is recommended should be well thought through, but my feeling is that this could lead to second-best advice being given.
You have some really big problems with your understanding of how Wikipedia works... First, you claim that ArbCom should be deciding our policy on role accounts and now you claim that admins should. You are completely wrong on both counts. Policy is determined by THE COMMUNITY.
On Sun, 2010-01-10 at 18:34 +0000, Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Shrug. Admins are never "obliged" to enforce policy if it gives a stupid result. ArbCom are "obliged" to make some sense out of what the policy pages say, bearing in mind the good of the mission. Asking for 1500 admins to come up with a consensus position is fairly futile. Asking an Arbitrator is consulting an informed person. I know what I'd think of an admin who blocked a school project on this technicality. i'll concede that what is recommended should be well thought through, but my feeling is that this could lead to second-best advice being given.
You have some really big problems with your understanding of how Wikipedia works... First, you claim that ArbCom should be deciding our policy on role accounts and now you claim that admins should. You are completely wrong on both counts. Policy is determined by THE COMMUNITY.
Right. And policy is enforced by admins, bureaucrats, checkusers, admins, stewards, and project arbcoms.
The issue on role accounts is that anyone who can use them can change the registered email address and password. So, shared accounts are out.
Any admin or, more appropriately, checkuser will tell you that generating a lot of similarly formed account names will raise suspicion. It's a common troll modus operandi - and it has been done from school IP addresses. I think Charles is speaking from the perspective of someone with access to nonpublic data. My concern is that said data may require accessed. On rare occasions a school's IT administrator may be contacted if they're a persistent source of vandalism; most admins never see that nonpublic information and may make blocking decisions they feel in line with policy but absent that knowledge.
Brian McNeil wrote:
On Sun, 2010-01-10 at 18:34 +0000, Thomas Dalton wrote:
2010/1/10 Charles Matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com:
Shrug. Admins are never "obliged" to enforce policy if it gives a stupid result. ArbCom are "obliged" to make some sense out of what the policy pages say, bearing in mind the good of the mission. Asking for 1500 admins to come up with a consensus position is fairly futile. Asking an Arbitrator is consulting an informed person. I know what I'd think of an admin who blocked a school project on this technicality. i'll concede that what is recommended should be well thought through, but my feeling is that this could lead to second-best advice being given.
You have some really big problems with your understanding of how Wikipedia works... First, you claim that ArbCom should be deciding our policy on role accounts and now you claim that admins should. You are completely wrong on both counts. Policy is determined by THE COMMUNITY.
Right. And policy is enforced by admins, bureaucrats, checkusers, admins, stewards, and project arbcoms.
The issue on role accounts is that anyone who can use them can change the registered email address and password. So, shared accounts are out.
Any admin or, more appropriately, checkuser will tell you that generating a lot of similarly formed account names will raise suspicion. It's a common troll modus operandi - and it has been done from school IP addresses. I think Charles is speaking from the perspective of someone with access to nonpublic data. My concern is that said data may require accessed. On rare occasions a school's IT administrator may be contacted if they're a persistent source of vandalism; most admins never see that nonpublic information and may make blocking decisions they feel in line with policy but absent that knowledge.
Come, now, save it for wikien-l. (Upper case is shouting, and I understand the operation of the enWP community perfectly well.)
Admins personally decide how to apply their extra buttons. If no admin wants to block some account, it stays unblocked. That is how it is, and how it should be. User:Tottelwiki was an American college project, it was editing a page I started, I didn't block it. My discretionary call.
This list is for WMUK, not soapboxing about enWP politics. Great job on the fundraising, by the way, Thomas, but why are you picking fights?
It looks like this, then. "Wikipedia welcomes school projects. If, however, you set one up the wrong way, you may be blocked by one of the site's jobsworths, in which case you'll find it useful to know the address of the unblock mailing list. Be quick about it, though, because if one of your GCSE class lads sets up an alternate account, your school may suffer an IP range block and you'll have some explaining to do to other staff members who had the same idea." A tad too honest for a guide, perhaps, but if the community is infallible ...
Charles
2010/1/9 Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com:
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
(...)
No sign of an article about the Ofqual guidance on their website yet, though.
It ran in this week's issue:
http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6033433
Thomas Dalton wrote:
Check this out: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6032750
It's about social media and education, which is an interesting topic in itself, but most importantly it contains this line:
"Wikis are web pages that can be easily edited, the most famous of which is Wikipedia, the world's largest encyclopedia."
A journalist knows the difference between "wiki" and "Wikipedia" - joy of joys! (The downside is that it suggests schools improve/create an article about their school as an example, which is something of a COI...)
I have had one or two letters published the T.H.E. about wikis, Wikimepia, etc (an example below) and will continue to be "Angry of Mayfair" when the need arises! It is always a pleasure to correct journalists (and academics).
T.E.S. = Times Educational Supplement
T.H.E. = Times Higher Education (was the THES)
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/
Gordon
*** *** *** *** *** ***
The wonder of Wikipedia
27 August 2009
Phil Tresadern (Letters, 20 August) does not appear to favour Wikipedia, even if quoted by Bruce Charlton (Letters, 13 August).
As every school and university student knows, Wikipedia is not a research journal (although it is peer reviewed). It is an online encyclopaedia with online and offline sources, and those sources can be anything that might verify the content of a Wikipedia article.
In the past few years, the drive to cite references and sources has grown, and Wikipedia stands (at 3 million articles in English alone) to be a fascinating and reliable resource, as opposed to much of the material to be found on the internet.
Gordon Joly, London.
wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org