[Air-L] assigning students their college/university wikipedia page

[Jennifer Stromer-Galley]

This goes into the "anything else you wish to share" column.

I teach an Internet literacy class, and we spend a week or so discussing
wikipedia. I teach this class in a computer lab, so each student has
their own computer. I directed them to view the entry on Web 2.0 in
Wikipedia. I asked them to read it, then view the history page. Much to
my surprise, a few of my students began to edit the Web 2.0 entry -- but
not in a constructive way. They were vandals. So, I seized on the
opportunity to further highlight and discuss the principles of editing
and authoring in wikipedia and the problems that vandals, such as my
students, have on the site. It served as a surprisingly useful
illustration of the joys and problems with wikipedia, and at my
direction the vandals deleted their handywork, and the page was
restored. 

I guess this is a lessons learned story. I did not anticipate that my
students in class would vandalze an entry. Perhaps the relative
anonymity of the vandalism enabled them to feel more free to act that
way (I did not know which student(s) engaged in the vandalism), or
perhaps I just happen to have some hooligans in class (very likely).
But, that hooligan-ness is likely shared beyond my UAlbany students. 

So, when teaching undergraduates about Wikipedia, and perhaps assigning
them the construction/watching of an entry, you might want to think
about how to handle cases in which your students become vandals, and how
to turn such acts into opportunities. 

Regards,
~Jenny

Assistant Professor
Department of Communication, SS 340
University at Albany, SUNY
Albany, NY 12222
518-442-4873
jstromer at albany.edu
http://www.albany.edu/~jstromer  

> -----Original Message-----
> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org 
> [mailto:air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of David M Silver
> Sent: Monday, November 10, 2008 3:44 PM
> To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
> Subject: [Air-L] assigning students their college/university 
> wikipedia page
> 
> aoir people,
> 
> has anyone had any experience with assigning students the 
> task of altering, improving, and tweaking their university 
> page on wikipedia? in other words, has anyone assigned their 
> college/university wikipedia page as a site of construction 
> for a class? if so, i'm curious to hear any anecdotes, 
> experiences, best-practices, relevant readings, and anything 
> else you wish to share.
> 
> david silver
> http://silverinsf.blogspot.com
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