Since I began teaching, Wikipedia has been "prohibited" when it comes to research projects and school assignments. I say "prohibited" in quotes because in reality, our students are using it daily. I believe it is a disservice not teaching them how to use it and that it is time for a shift in our perception of Wikipedia. Research is even beginning to show that Wikipedia is as accurate as Britannica.
Now I'm not advocating directly citing Wikipedia as a resource for a research project. But Wikipedia can be used to write a better paper, to strengthen your research, and to gain a better understanding your topic. I found these 4 tips for using Wikipedia and wanted to share them with you:
"The goal here is not to take Wikipedia as gospel but to use it to focus your research (via links, keywords and references) and get a little context (via background information). Focusing cuts down the time you spend on the project while context will get you a better grade for your effort." - Rebecca
"Wikipedia deserves the same place in most modern assignments that Britannica did in most of ours. It was a starting point and a collection of additional references for our research. It gave us the general background we needed to dig further. Wikipedia does the same, with remarkable reliability given the success of the crowdsourcing model. Wikipedia, however, makes most of those primary sources and deeper research possibilities available within just a few clicks. We don’t need to teach our kids not to use Wikipedia. We need to teach them to make those extra few clicks and decide for themselves if the Wikipedia entry has merit. It’s a skill that is broadly applicable in an age of information overload and Google’s billions of search results." - Christopher Dawson
"Shamelessly snagging" related articles from The Daring Librarian ;)
Teaching Wikipedia At-A-Glance Comic Tutorial also courtesy of The Daring Librarian.
Now I'm not advocating directly citing Wikipedia as a resource for a research project. But Wikipedia can be used to write a better paper, to strengthen your research, and to gain a better understanding your topic. I found these 4 tips for using Wikipedia and wanted to share them with you:
- Background information: The Grapes of Wrath makes a lot more sense if you understand the dust bowl of the depression. The fighting in Iraq makes more sense if you understand that it wasn’t until after World War I that it became one country under the British. Knowing the context of your topic can help you understand that material better and write about it more clearly.
- Links: At the bottom of every article is a list of external links. These sites are often articles or respected authorities that you CAN cite. For example you could use a few lines from the Woody Guthrie song //Tom Joad// about his experience of seeing the film Grapes of Wrath in a paper on the topic. There are also good links in the Notes section (which are the references for factual statements made in the article).
- Keywords: Sometimes coming up with the right keywords for a library or Google search is the hardest part of a research project. The Wikipedia page can give you a ton of clues about what word combinations will get you the best results. For example “drought” gets a lot more irrelevant hits than “dust bowl”.
- References: Also at the bottom of each article is a list of books and articles that were used to put this article together. Those are things you can read and later cite. A librarian can help you get a copy if you can’t find them yourself.
"The goal here is not to take Wikipedia as gospel but to use it to focus your research (via links, keywords and references) and get a little context (via background information). Focusing cuts down the time you spend on the project while context will get you a better grade for your effort." - Rebecca
"Wikipedia deserves the same place in most modern assignments that Britannica did in most of ours. It was a starting point and a collection of additional references for our research. It gave us the general background we needed to dig further. Wikipedia does the same, with remarkable reliability given the success of the crowdsourcing model. Wikipedia, however, makes most of those primary sources and deeper research possibilities available within just a few clicks. We don’t need to teach our kids not to use Wikipedia. We need to teach them to make those extra few clicks and decide for themselves if the Wikipedia entry has merit. It’s a skill that is broadly applicable in an age of information overload and Google’s billions of search results." - Christopher Dawson
"Shamelessly snagging" related articles from The Daring Librarian ;)
- Should I use or cite Wikipedia? Probably not.
- Teachers: Please stop prohibiting the use of Wikipedia
- Unnatural acts at Nature
- 20 Little Known Ways to Use Wikipedia
- Study: Wikipedia as Accurate as Britannica
- Rosenzweig, Roy. "Can history by open source? Wikipedia and the future of the past" Journal of American History, Volume 93, Issue 1 (June 2006) p. 117-144.
- Schiff, Stacy. "Know it all: Can Wikipedia conquer expertise?" The New Yorker, February 26, 2006.
Teaching Wikipedia At-A-Glance Comic Tutorial also courtesy of The Daring Librarian.