By the end of the semester, your writing should meet Wikipedia’s guidelines and should cite at least 4 authoritative sources. Your grade on this project will be based on a final packet, with an annotated bibliography, reflection essay, and final contribution to Wikipedia. By going through this process and adding to an article on Wikipedia, you will help to close information gaps on the platform.
We progressed through the following steps in our semester-long project. These steps are scaffolded and introduced as we move through the semester:
- Discussion of information bias
- Students choose Wikipedia page
- Introduction to Wikipedia and introduction to searching with Jennifer (librarian)
- Draft of writing for peer review (in class)
- Draft of writing for professor review
- Make writing live to Wikipedia (in-class with Jennifer—librarian)
- Continued edits and interacting with Wikipedia editors
- Final packet submitted to professor consisting of a short reflective essay, annotated bibliography, and best draft of their writing (as determined by the learner)
The first step—discussion of information bias—will likely vary from class to class. Jessica used this time to set up the relationship between information bias and course content. Jennifer made the inspired suggestion of using an article from The Atlantic titled “This Article Won’t Change Your Mind” as assigned reading for this day of class (Beck, 2017). Building on this reading, Jessica led a discussion of the cultural life of ideas and what kinds of information are appropriate or convincing in what situation. This can easily bridge to a discussion of information privilege and why we are editing Wikipedia in our course. The professor can introduce this link even earlier, if desired, on the first day of class. Any first-day activity that asks students to think about the nature of information in the course discipline will work. Jessica has
