08 14 Wikipedia Web CT Discussion

Compiled Messages:

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Message no. 1Posted by Zan Goncalves (CALDER_07) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 9:34am
Subject: Your discussion topic for the day
Middlebury College has recently introduced a ban on all student use of Wikipedia for research projects. Should FPU consider instituting a similar ban? Why or why not? (base your discussion on your sense of the value of selected entries from Wikipedia, as well as on your understanding of how this online encyclopedia creates and monitors its entries).
Make your posts reasonably short this time--3-5 lines--so you have time to read and respond to others' posts. Also feel free to quote from Wikipedia as you work.
Time: about 40 minutes of discussion.
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Message no. 2[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Kelly Kilcrease (kilcreak) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:11am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
I feel that the technology should be used and not removed from students. It provides a good starting place for students to gain an overview into a subject area. For example, the term "Paradigm" provides a good quick information for students. Further, it does provide connecting sites that “could” be of value. However, I stress that it should be used a starting point only.
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Message no. 4[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Nancy Lloyd (lloydn) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:17am
Subject: Rhetoric
This has been a very good exercise for me. First, I'm reminded of what Rhetoric does mean. Second, I plan to use the word in a lab session to explain further College Writing I and go on from there to research.Nancy Lloyd

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Message no. 5[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Mark Caulkins (caulkinsm) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:18am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
My personal opinion is that Wikipedia is overall helpful, particularly when looking up something relatively new or unknown. As there is no official referee, obviously there can be gibberish entered, and this needs to be known. For more factual information (say anatomic structures), I have generally found it to be highly accurate. For more subjective concepts, it certainly may be colored by the contributor's bias.I encourage students to begin their study there if they wish, and follow links to more 'scholarly' sites. I do not allow students to formally cite Wikipedia
Mark
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Message no. 6[Branch from no. 4]
Posted by Nancy Lloyd (lloydn) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:19am
Subject: Re: Rhetoric
This has been a very good exercise for me. First, I'm reminded of what Rhetoric does mean. Second, I plan to use the word in a lab session to explain further College Writing I and go on from there to research.Nancy Lloyd

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Message no. 7[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Ron Drogy (drogyr) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:21am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
Based on the technical term I searched for on Wikipedia, "Essay," I would be opposed to an entire ban on Wikipedia. The information on essay was very thorough, useful, and authoratative. Also, I am concerned about freedom of speech. Why ban a source of information? I also searched for "thesis," which led me to "thesis statement." The entry was at least acceptable, with useful links and a "See also" that led me to "essay." I would consider not allowing students to use it as scholarly source, but I am not that familiar with Wikipedia to know why it should be banned.
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Message no. 8[Branch from no. 5]
Posted by Kelly Kilcrease (kilcreak) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:23am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
I like your point about the bias aspect. Does anyone know how these are evaluated?
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Message no. 9[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Donna Decker (reckd) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:25am
Subject: Donna's & Tracy's Wikipedia Thoughts
The term I looked up on Wikipedia was "male gaze," inspired by Wini's article we read for homework. What popped up is the broader term "gaze."
If I imagine my students in Introduction to Women's Studies, for example, trying to understand the term "male gaze" from page #1 of the 6 pages devoted to the term, I am unsatisfied. I become satisfied with a form of definition I find on page 2-3: "The defining characteristic of the male gaze is that the audience is forced to regard the action and characters ofa text through the perspective of a heterosexual man; the camera lingers on the curves of the female body, and events which occur to women are presented largely in the context of a man's reactions to these events. The male gaze denies women agency, relegating them to the status of objects. The female reader or viewer must experience the narrative secondarily, by identification with the male."
Even that definition fails to stand on its own as an instructive piece of text. I would want examples, that I can provide in class.
Tracy noted that when she went to the site, there was a box that indicated the definition of "male gaze" was in dispute. That is an important point that did not turn up in my search.
The question of whether FPU should ban Wikipedia? Tracy says no campus-wide ban, but individual professors can ban in a classroom.I say the same.I tend to think W. should not be used as a source in a works cited page -- but only as a starting point that must be further discussed in class, under "guidance" of professor.
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Message no. 10[Branch from no. 7]
Posted by Nancy Lloyd (lloydn) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:25am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
Ron - I feel the same way about the definition for rhetoric. I'm going to use it as a tool - then let them do it so as well BUTnot as a scholarly source.
NL
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Message no. 12[Branch from no. 8]
Posted by Mark Caulkins (caulkinsm) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:29am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
I don't know for sure, but I think that anyone can post anything they want.
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Message no. 13Posted by Donna Decker (reckd) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:30am
Subject: Whose definitions?
So, W. allows editing. Who gets to edit? anyone? how do we know what is edited and who edited it. What if it is inaccurate or WRONG or in bad taste, etc. Is there a corrective measure, a referee, as someone said earlier?
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Message no. 14[Branch from no. 2]
Posted by Zan Goncalves (CALDER_07) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:31am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
In message 2 on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:11am, Kelly Kilcrease (kilcreak) writes:>I feel that the technology should be used and not removed from students.
I really agee with this point. In principle, I think it is wrong to ban any piece of software, especially one as well known and widely used as Wikipedia. Rather, we should take the opportunity to educate our students about how to use resources critically. They should be able to evaluate the effectiveness and reliability of a source that relies oan community-generated information rather than authority-generated information.
Wini
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Message no. 15Posted by Scott Niemi (niemis) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:31am
Subject: Post Modern
I chose "Post Modern" because it is a concept central to the current art world. I found the entry to be informative, accurate and scholarly according to my knowledge. I can't think of anything that I would be able to add to the definition.
I would allow my students to use Wikipedia as an initial starting point for information, but it would have to be backed up by additional research. They wouldn't be able to quote it in papers, or other written print other than for discussion, including making the argument for, or against it's entries.
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Message no. 16Posted by Donna Decker (reckd) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:32am
Subject: Does everyone have academic freedom?
Do students? Do adjuncts? Do full time profs? Do staff members?
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Message no. 17Posted by Zan Goncalves (CALDER_07) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:35am
Subject: Middlebury decision--a link
It was the Middlebury history department that made the "ban" I refer to. Here's a link to an article about the ban: http://www.middlebury.edu/about/newsevents/archive/2007/newsevents_633084484309809133.htm.
Wini
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Message no. 18[Branch from no. 9]
Posted by Mark Caulkins (caulkinsm) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:36am
Subject: Re: Donna's & Tracy's Wikipedia Thoughts
Again, I think that the source for any material needs to be considered. Peer-reviewed scholarly articles are supposedly the gold standard, but at the top of any field there is disagreement at the 'cutting edge'.In medicine, there is a large body of information that is considered 'standard of care'. Then there is the research being performed at University centers that seeks to expand knowledge and treatments in new directions. Some of this research leads nowhere, some may cause harm, some will eventually be recognized as beneficial, and eventually become the new 'standard of care'.It is important to be able to recognize the source of any information you are studying and be able to see what category it falls into. Unfortunately, when you don't know a subject, then you don't know what is considered accurate.
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Message no. 20[Branch from no. 16]
Posted by Ron Drogy (drogyr) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:59am
Subject: Re: Does everyone have academic freedom?
Great question! Shouldn't students at least have access to Wikipedia, as a matter of academic and intellectual freedom; otherwise we are practicing a very conservative version of censorship.
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Message no. 21[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Zan Goncalves (CALDER_07) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 10:59am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
I like the discussion of Wikipedia because this gets us to the corecultural issue as we add digital resources to print resources as commonreferents. Our thinking in academia is now based very much on printvalues: knowledge that is slowly developed and slowly changed by alimited set of experts ("slow" compared to digital resources, that is). Print resources have become equated with knowledge. But now we havethis new phenomenon of digital resources being updated every minute ofevery day -- instead of a collection of books as a baseline in a field,we see emerging something like Wikipedia as another baseline of currency.
Wikipedia represents "the wisdom of the crowds." The Internet canaggregate and organize multiple inputs on the spot as book publisherscould never do. Wikipedia through its brief history has been monitoredby thousands of eyes and is regularly updated and corrected. But, ofcourse, more and more oversight has had to emerge. Some people hadagendas and kept posting to push their agendas. Wikipedia, on averagein each entry, has one more error than the Britannica (4 instead of 3);but on the other hand it is current and the Britannica is not.
The conflict is that Wikipedia and digital discourse is closer to"orality" and further from "literacy" than the traditional encyclopedia. How do faculty members deal with a move away from the standards ofprint technology and its values and toward digital technology and itsdifferent values? Both print and digital offer fantastic learningopportunities, but those opportunities are not the same.
Trent
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Message no. 22[Branch from no. 1]
Posted by Minghua Li (liming) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 11:19am
Subject: Re: Your discussion topic for the day
I think if Wikipedia is the best source the students can find then why can't they use it? They should be careful when they cite from Wikipedia and validate what they quote is accurate.
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Message no. 24[Branch from no. 17]
Posted by Zan Goncalves (CALDER_07) on Tuesday, August 14, 2007 12:12pm
Subject: Re: Middlebury decision--a link
I think this link should work....
Wini
http://www.middlebury.edu/about/newsevents/archive/2007/newsevents_633084484309809133.htm
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