tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/online-skills-15875/articlesOnline skills – The Conversation2018-01-04T04:33:37Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/875662018-01-04T04:33:37Z2018-01-04T04:33:37ZTrust in digital technology will be the internet’s next frontier, for 2018 and beyond<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199508/original/file-20171215-17857-cns8cs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Trust in online systems varies around the world.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/technologies-connect-people-mixed-media-588071525">Sergey Nivens/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>After decades of unbridled enthusiasm – bordering on <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/05/18/527799301/is-internet-addiction-real">addiction</a> – about all things digital, the public may be <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/insider/tech-column-dread.html">losing trust in technology</a>. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2017/10/09/pierre-omidyar-6-ways-social-media-has-become-a-direct-threat-to-democracy/">Online information isn’t reliable</a>, whether it appears in the form of news, search results or user reviews. Social media, in particular, is <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/social-media-giants-are-vulnerable-to-foreign-propaganda-what-can-they-do-to-change">vulnerable to manipulation</a> by hackers or foreign powers. Personal data <a href="https://hbr.org/2017/12/what-would-you-pay-to-keep-your-digital-footprint-100-private">isn’t necessarily private</a>. And people are increasingly worried about automation and artificial intelligence <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/technology/ai-will-transform-the-economy-but-how-much-and-how-soon.html">taking humans’ jobs</a>.</p>
<p>Yet, around the world, people are both increasingly dependent on, and distrustful of, digital technology. They don’t behave as if they mistrust technology. Instead, people are using technological tools more intensively in all aspects of daily life. In recent research on <a href="https://sites.tufts.edu/digitalplanet/executive-summary/">digital trust in 42 countries</a> (a collaboration between Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where I work, and Mastercard), my colleagues and I found that this paradox is a global phenomenon. </p>
<p>If today’s technology giants don’t do anything to address this unease in an environment of growing dependence, people might start looking for more trustworthy companies and systems to use. Then Silicon Valley’s powerhouses could see their business boom go bust.</p>
<h2>Economic power</h2>
<p>Some of the concerns have to do with how big a role the technology companies and their products play in people’s lives. <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/30/health/americans-screen-time-nielsen/index.html">U.S. residents already spend 10 hours a day</a> in front of a screen of some kind. One in 5 Americans say they are online “<a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/12/08/one-fifth-of-americans-report-going-online-almost-constantly/">almost constantly</a>.” The tech companies have enormous reach and power. <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/27/technology/facebook-2-billion-users/index.html">More than 2 billion people</a> use Facebook every month.</p>
<p><a href="http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share">Ninety percent of search queries worldwide</a> go through Google. Chinese e-retailer, Alibaba, organizes the biggest shopping event worldwide every year on Nov. 11, which this year brought in <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/alibabas-singles-day-bigger-than-black-friday-cyber-monday-combined-2017-11">US$25.3 billion in revenue</a>, more than twice what U.S. retailers sold between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday last year. </p>
<p>This results in enormous wealth. All six companies in the world <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-21/tencent-s-292-billion-rally-ousts-facebook-from-global-top-five">worth more than $500 billion</a> are tech firms. The <a href="https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/blog/employer-brand/2017/revealing-the-25-most-sought-after-employers-globally">top six most sought-after companies to work for</a> are also in tech. Tech <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-boom-creates-new-order-for-world-markets-1511260200">stocks are booming</a>, in ways reminiscent of the giddy days of the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-the-dot-com-bubble-began-and-why-it-popped-2010-12">dot-com bubble</a> of 1997 to 2001. With emerging technologies, including the “<a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/12/13/2-tech-giants-are-teaming-up-for-the-internet-of-t.aspx">internet of things</a>,” <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/12/are-we-going-too-fast-driverless-cars">self-driving cars</a>, <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/future-of-bitcoin-blockchain-2018/">blockchain</a> systems and <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/jobs/by-2020-artificial-intelligence-will-create-more-jobs-than-it-eliminates-gartner/articleshow/62053363.cms">artificial intelligence</a>, tempting investors and entrepreneurs, the reach and power of the industry is only likely to grow. </p>
<p>This is particularly true because <a href="https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/service-provider/vni-network-traffic-forecast/infographic.html">half the world’s population</a> is still not online. But networking giant Cisco projects that <a href="https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/service-provider/vni-network-traffic-forecast/infographic.html">58 percent of the world</a> will be online by 2021, and the volume of internet traffic per month per user will grow 150 percent from 2016 to 2021.</p>
<p>All these users will be deciding on how much to trust digital technologies.</p>
<h2>Data, democracy and the day job</h2>
<p>Even now, the reasons for collective unease about technology are piling up. Consumers are learning to be worried about the security of their personal information: News about a data breach involving <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/6943d9ab-c91b-3718-928e-67a802a9c463">57 million</a> Uber accounts follows on top of reports of a breach of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/02/business/equifax-breach.html">the 145.5 million consumer data records</a> on Equifax and every Yahoo account – <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/03/technology/business/yahoo-breach-3-billion-accounts/index.html">3 billion</a> in all. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/31/us/politics/facebook-twitter-google-hearings-congress.html">Russia was able to meddle</a> with Facebook, Google and Twitter during the 2016 election campaign. That has raised concerns about whether the openness and reach of digital media is a threat to the functioning of democracies.</p>
<p>Another technological threat to society comes from workplace automation. The management consulting firm, McKinsey, estimates that it could <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/global-themes/future-of-organizations-and-work/what-the-future-of-work-will-mean-for-jobs-skills-and-wages">displace one-third of the U.S. workforce</a> by 2030, even if a different set of technologies create new <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/global-themes/future-of-organizations-and-work/the-digital-future-of-work-is-the-9-to-5-job-going-the-way-of-the-dinosaur">“gig” opportunities</a>.</p>
<p>The challenge for tech companies is that they operate in global markets and the extent to which these concerns affect behaviors online varies significantly around the world. </p>
<h2>Mature markets differ from emerging ones</h2>
<p><a href="https://sites.tufts.edu/digitalplanet/executive-summary/">Our research</a> uncovers some interesting differences in behaviors across geographies. In areas of the world with smaller digital economies and where technology use is still growing rapidly, users tend to exhibit more trusting behaviors online. These users are more likely to stick with a website even if it loads slowly, is hard to use or requires many steps for making an online purchase. This could be because the experience is still novel and there are fewer convenient alternatives either online or offline.</p>
<p>In the mature digital markets of Western Europe, North America, Japan and South Korea, however, people have been using the internet, mobile phones, social media and smartphone apps for many years. Users in those locations are less trusting, prone to switching away from sites that don’t load rapidly or are hard to use, and abandoning online shopping carts if the purchase process is too complex.</p>
<p>Because people in more mature markets have less trust, I would expect tech companies to invest in trust-building in more mature digital markets. For instance, they might speed up and streamline processing of e-commerce transactions and payments, or more clearly label the sources of information presented on social media sites, as the <a href="https://www.scu.edu/ethics/focus-areas/journalism-ethics/programs/the-trust-project/">Trust Project</a> is doing, helping to identify authenticated and reliable news sources.</p>
<p>Consider Facebook’s situation. In response to criticism for allowing fake Russian accounts to distribute fake news on its site, CEO Mark Zuckerberg boldly <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/01/facebook-says-costs-will-rise-to-go-after-fake-news.html">declared that</a>, “Protecting our community is more important than maximizing our profits.” However, according to the company’s chief financial officer, Facebook’s 2018 operating expenses could increase by <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/01/facebook-says-costs-will-rise-to-go-after-fake-news.html">45 to 60 percent</a> if it were to invest significantly in building trust, such as <a href="https://www.popsci.com/Facebook-hiring-3000-content-monitors">hiring more humans to review posts</a> and <a href="https://thenextweb.com/facebook/2017/08/03/facebook-enlists-ai-in-war-on-fake-news/">developing artificial intelligence systems</a> to help them. Those costs would lower Facebook’s profits.</p>
<p>To strike a balance between profitability and trustworthiness, Facebook will have to set priorities and deploy advanced trust-building technologies (e.g. vetting locally generated news and ads) in only some geographic markets.</p>
<h2>The future of digital distrust</h2>
<p>As the boundaries of the digital world expand, and more people become familiar with internet technologies and systems, their distrust will grow. As a result, companies seeking to enjoy consumer trust will need to invest in becoming more trustworthy more widely around the globe. Those that do will likely see a competitive advantage, winning more loyalty from customers.</p>
<p>This risks creating a new type of digital divide. Even as one global inequality disappears – more people have an opportunity to go online – some countries or regions may have significantly more trustworthy online communities than others. Especially in the less-trustworthy regions, users will need governments to enact strong digital policies to protect people from fake news and fraudulent scams, as well as regulatory oversight to protect consumers’ data privacy and human rights.</p>
<p>All consumers will need to remain on guard against overreach by heavy-handed authorities or autocratic governments, particularly in parts of the world where consumers are new to using technology and, therefore, more trusting. And they’ll need to keep an eye on companies, to make sure they invest in trust-building more evenly around the world, even in less mature markets. Fortunately, digital technology makes watchdogs’ work easier, and also can serve as a megaphone – such as on social media – to issue alerts, warnings or praise.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87566/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhaskar Chakravorti directs the Institute for Business in the Global Context that receives funding from Mastercard, Microsoft and the Gates Foundation. </span></em></p>Around the world, people are both increasingly dependent on, and distrustful of, digital technology. New research suggests ways this conflict could unfold.Bhaskar Chakravorti, Senior Associate Dean, International Business & Finance, Tufts UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/854522017-10-16T18:48:09Z2017-10-16T18:48:09ZThree strategies to help students navigate dodgy online content<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190297/original/file-20171016-27757-1w0159r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Readers should cast a more critical eye over information they use from the web, to make sure the knowledge built from it is trustworthy and accurate.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A recent <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/331996442/Stanford-History-Education-Group-Evaluating-Information-The-Cornerstone-of-Civic-Online-Reasoning">Stanford University Report</a> revealed that students’ abilities to distinguish between questionable and valid online content needed work. </p>
<p>In one example cited in the report, researchers set high school and university students a task to evaluate the credibility of information found on the <em><a href="https://www.minimumwage.com/">MinimumWage.com</a></em> site. Only 9% of high school students and 6% of university students could identify the site was actually a front for a right-wing think-tank. </p>
<p>The lack of critical judgement displayed by high school and university students in this example is, as the report’s authors identified, a challenge that’s <a href="https://www.aft.org/ae/fall2017/mcgrew_ortega_breakstone_wineburg">bigger than fake news</a>.</p>
<p>It doesn’t just affect young people, either. In analysing the issue, the problem is not so much how we educate to identify hoax sites, as generally these are low frequency and quickly identifiable. The real challenge is how we educate people, both young and old, to critically evaluate the perspectives, aims and purposes of a website. In short, how do we help people distinguish between fact and opinion? </p>
<p>Here are three strategies based on the findings of the <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/331996442/Stanford-History-Education-Group-Evaluating-Information-The-Cornerstone-of-Civic-Online-Reasoning">Stanford Report</a> to help navigate the online information minefield.</p>
<h2>1. Get off the website</h2>
<p>A traditional approach to educating about these challenges has been conducting “website evaluations” using a checklist. This usually involves judging the reliability of a site based on the information it contains, such as a named author, the publication date, domain name, and so on.</p>
<p>However, this approach underestimates how sophisticated and deceptive the internet has become. Instead of a vertical checklist approach, web users need to interact laterally. That involves getting off the website and searching for other information that can provide clues as to the validity and balance of information it contains. For example, thoroughly researching sites’ authors may reveal their political alignments, if they are funded by another person or organisation with particular agendas, and so on. Accurate answers to such questions will most likely only be found off the website. </p>
<h2>2. Use a site’s reference list</h2>
<p>Another good strategy is to go straight to the site’s reference list, if one is available. If no reference list is provided, it may well be a good reason to dig deeper.</p>
<h2>3. Identify adjectives</h2>
<p>Adjectives describe how something feels, looks, sounds and acts. They indicate the tone or mood of the message and suggest to readers how they should respond to the content of the site. A savvy web user can identify adjectives, think critically about how these encourage them to view the content of the site, and then evaluate the compatibility between the message itself and the effect of how the message is communicated.</p>
<p>These are just a few practical tips. Above all, readers should cast a more critical eye over information they use from the web, to make sure the knowledge built from it is trustworthy and accurate.</p>
<h2>The myth of the “digital native”</h2>
<p>“Digital native” was a buzz term of the early 2000’s, used to define young people born into a digital world. According to the architect of the <a href="http://marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf">“digital native” narrative, Marc Prensky,</a> if you were born before 1980, you were known as a <a href="http://marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf">“digital immigrant”</a>. Digital immigrants allegedly struggle with the technical domain that digital natives find so natural. </p>
<p>However, this narrative promoted an “us” versus “them” divide and did little to further our understanding of how young people interact with online information. The native generation may well be good at <a href="https://www.aft.org/ae/fall2017/mcgrew_ortega_breakstone_wineburg">flicking between Facebook, Twitter and Instagram whilst texting</a> their best friend about what’s happening on those sites, but the acts of “liking” or “friending” seldom involve making critical judgements.</p>
<p>It could be argued that young people’s saturated use of social media actually works against building critical thinking capabilities, as their interaction with the information is generally at a low level such as (re)tweeting, or simply claiming or making a positive or negative response. </p>
<p>We also need to remember that people born pre-1980 are not necessarily bad with technology. Time has exposed the “digital native versus digital immigrant” narrative to be little more than popular folklore. Even Prensky has backed away from the debate, and now considers we should concentrate on building something he calls <a href="http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky-Intro_to_From_DN_to_DW.pdf">“digital wisdom”</a>.</p>
<p>Building “digital wisdom”, the ability to select accurate and balanced online information and use it productively to construct robust and well-informed perspectives and knowledge, should be the goal for education at all levels.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85452/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A report has discovered that while students born after 1980 have good digital skills, they need to think more critically about what they read online.Kim Wilson, Lecturer in History Education, Macquarie UniversityGarry Falloon, Professor of Digital Learning, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/444412015-07-24T11:28:40Z2015-07-24T11:28:40ZWhat’s the point of education if Google can tell us anything?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89631/original/image-20150724-7578-ih39cf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">University in your pocket?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">successo images/www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Can’t remember the name of the two elements that scientist Marie Curie discovered? Or who won the 1945 UK general election? Or how many light years away the sun is from the earth? Ask Google. </p>
<p>Constant access to an abundance of online information at the click of a mouse or tap of a smartphone has radically reshaped how we socialise, inform ourselves of the world around us and organise our lives. If all facts can be summoned instantly by looking online, what’s the point of spending years learning them at school and university? In the future, it might be that once young people have mastered the basics of how to read and write, they undertake their entire education merely through accessing the internet via search engines such as Google, as and when they want to know something. </p>
<p>Some <a href="https://newsletter.alt.ac.uk/2012/02/the-self-organised-learning-environment-sole-school-support-pack/">educational theorists</a> have argued that you can replace teachers, classrooms, textbooks and lectures by simply leaving students to their own devices to search and collect information about a particular topic online. Such ideas have called into question the value of a traditional system of education, one in which teachers simply impart knowledge to students. Of course, <a href="https://theconversation.com/cloud-schooling-why-we-still-need-teachers-in-the-internet-age-19872">others have warned</a> against the dangers of this kind of thinking and the importance of the teacher and human contact when it comes to learning. </p>
<p>Such debate about the place and purpose of online searching in learning and assessments is <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/11572349/Pupils-should-be-allowed-to-Google-in-exams-says-exam-chief.html">not new</a>. But rather than thinking of ways to prevent students from cheating or plagiarising in their assessed pieces of work, maybe our obsession with the “authenticity” of their coursework or assessment is missing another important educational point. </p>
<h2>Digital content curators</h2>
<p>In my recent <a href="http://ibrarspace.net/2014/12/16/video-abstract-phd-thesis/">research</a> looking at the ways students write their assignments, I found that increasingly they may not always compose written work which is truly “authentic”, and that this may not be as important as we think. Instead, through prolific use of the internet, students engaged in a number of sophisticated practices to search, sift, critically evaluate, anthologise and re-present pre-existing content. Through a close examination of the moment-by-moment work of the way students write assignments, I came to see how all the pieces of text students produced contained elements of something else. These practices need to be better understood and then incorporated into new forms of education and assessment. </p>
<p>These online practices are about harnessing an abundance of information from a multitude of sources, including search engines like Google, in what I call a form of “digital content curation”. Curation in this sense is about how learners use existing content to produce new content through engaging in problem-solving and intellectual inquiry, and creating a new experience for readers. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89633/original/image-20150724-7599-1p4pwix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lessons in how to search.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Students via bikeriderlondon/www.shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Part of this is developing a critical eye about what’s being searched for online, or “<a href="http://rheingold.com/2013/crap-detection-mini-course/">crap-detection</a>”, whilst wading through the deluge of available information. This aspect is vital to any educationally serious notion of information curation, as learners increasingly use the web as extensions of their own <a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-internet-has-become-the-external-hard-drive-for-our-memories/?page=3">memory</a> when searching.</p>
<p>Students must begin by understanding that most online content is already curated by search engines like Google using their <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank">PageRank</a> algorithm and other indicators. Curation, therefore, becomes a kind of stewardship of other people’s writing and requires entering into a conversation with the writers of those texts. It is a crucial kind of ‘digital literacy’</p>
<p>Curation has, through pervasive connectivity, found its way into educational contexts. There is now a need to better understand how practices of online searching and the kinds of writing emerging from curation can be incorporated into the way we assess students. </p>
<h2>How to assess these new skills</h2>
<p>While writing for assessment tends to focus on the production of a student’s own, “authentic” work, it could also take curation practices into account. Take, for example, a project designed as a kind of digital portfolio. This could require students to locate information on a particular question, organise existing web extracts in a digestible and story-like way, acknowledge their sources, and present an argument or thesis. </p>
<p>Solving problems through synthesising large amounts of information, often collaboratively, and engaging in exploratory and problem-solving pursuits (rather than just memorising facts and dates) are key skills in the 21st century, information-based economy. As the <a href="http://www.theworkfoundation.com/Assets/Docs/LCCI-CET%20Future%20Skills%20Policy%20FINAL%2001%2011%2010.pdf">London Chamber of Commerce</a> has highlighted, we must make sure young people and graduates enter employment with these skills. </p>
<p>My own research has shown that young people may already be expert curators as part of their everyday internet experience and surreptitious assignment writing strategies. Teachers and lecturers need to explore and understand these practices better, and create learning opportunities and academic assessment tasks around these somewhat “<a href="http://www.aqa.org.uk/supporting-education/policy/the-future-of-assessment-2025-and-beyond/assessing-hard-to-assess-skills">hard to assess</a>” skills.</p>
<p>In an era of informational abundance, educational end-products – the exam or piece of coursework – need to become less about a single student creating an “authentic” text, and more about a certain kind of digital literacy which harnesses the wisdom of the network of information that is available at the click of a button.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/44441/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ibrar Bhatt received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for his PhD research.</span></em></p>The way schools and universities teach and test has to keep up with the way young people are processing information.Ibrar Bhatt, Senior Research Associate, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/391032015-04-03T10:12:53Z2015-04-03T10:12:53ZUsing Wikipedia: a scholar redraws academic lines by including it in his syllabus<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76963/original/image-20150402-9328-1sfhyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Wikipedia is coming into the classroom in new ways.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bastique/639784808/in/photolist-Yx4Jy-aeyphU-Dm4mQ-8Xk9wd-8vMaCk-87zVAe-aeyp4o-beLrpH-39hab-8fPixb-7JgHLk-6yWQJ9-8vQeWE-64zsLg-3PTXnr-9DAJd5-Yx4GJ-aBxUaK-bQJCr6-6sYeby-aeAjuf-4JVgL-cuNbQG-5UJsKH-doe4xN-4RicGv-532v2c-C3C52-9zAePZ-fSGVcv-bf1Gt2-5G6eHw-aeypcu-beGHH6-ebVPse-57hYVH-6uT1ou-6mCZGX-ejGYrk-8mKt1-m7caTd-98ZhyR-4PKfjA-m7b6qX-LzFA8-iQzkDW-vHM8C-39o88-AjZA-6kLGHs">Cary Bass-Deschenes</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>If you are familiar with the phrase <a href="http://study.com/academy/lesson/hidden-curriculum-in-education-definition-examples-quiz.html">“hidden curriculum”</a> (referring to rules, norms and behaviors that are taught intentionally or not in nearly all classes), then the idea that Wikipedia is not a place to find “legitimate” information on a subject falls well within the purview of the term. </p>
<p>Most professors mention the website as “that place that you are not allowed to cite in your research papers”. This mini-lesson is hammered into the head of every freshman, sophomore, junior and senior. </p>
<p>Yet, Wikipedia remains a popular resource for both students and professors when they need immediate access to specific bits of information that fall outside of their areas of knowledge. Wikipedia is <a href="http://www.alexa.com/topsites">the #6 most accessed website in the world</a>, and the only nonprofit site in the bunch.</p>
<p>In essence, we have a love-hate relationship with Wikipedia in higher education. </p>
<p>In my classes, however, I’ve been experimenting for the past six years with how we might move beyond this narrow, schizophrenic approach to one of the most popular educational resources online. And what I’ve found is that my students are excited by the idea of engaging with this part of the internet that is otherwise deemed “off-limits” in their courses.</p>
<p>I teach our required course in sociological theory - something, admittedly, most students dread. Students are not just reluctant to take a course they haven’t chosen, but they also suspect, and rightly so, that they’ll be delving though texts that are often hundreds of years old, written in jargon-heavy terms for other academics, and often translated from a foreign language into English. </p>
<p>To address, in part, this interest gap that most students arrive with, for the past five years I have been requiring each of them to “adopt” the Wikipedia page of a particular sociological theorist (such as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Horkheimer">Max Horkheimer</a>). </p>
<h2>Students adopt a Wikipedia page</h2>
<p>First the students individually draw a card from a “deck of social theorists” I’ve constructed to reveal the name and photograph of the sociologist they’ll be researching for the project. While they’re welcome to exchange their card with someone else, or even draw again, I find that most stick with the one they’ve drawn originally.</p>
<p>Students then review their adopted theorist’s page and begin the process of upgrading the information in a way that reflects research practices that meet the standards of what we might consider acceptable in academia.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76965/original/image-20150402-9328-1mo6prd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Students learn by editing Wikipedia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/127568736@N02/15090540084/in/photolist-dn6K1e-pWhmbX-oZuXPA-oZuXiL-oPTnka-7bo7Pg-oZy17V-pWhmeH-oZxXJi-oZxX4a-qcSB4-2RF1Ds-35Pi5N-6Xv72U-ojnA4-pDU7YY-pW7CtH-pWhmLz-9ZHEf-hDxMVS-hDx7zs-oZy1Hp-8AjNs-beMknB-9KV2pv-3k6zGC-5f9iad-TKxL-jArozB-6t9yvC-ap7x-iH2PU-8QhsD5-aB4f71-8prdvp-qfCFt-6QLo2u-5NXnYg-pK298e-9aBzwc-9n8t8u-9ybPV-6JxYJc-3qDJx-E1o39-gJ3ivk-gJ48up-93xd5g-3wcdWC-7NK54J">Wikimedia Finland</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In other words, they proofread the text, correct citations, visit the college library in search of relevant books, dig through online academic databases, and piece together a puzzle of why we value these particular theorists and how their work allows us to reveal parts of the world that might otherwise remain hidden to us. </p>
<p>Students document their research process in a paper they turn in along with a “before” and “after” version of the theorist’s Wikipedia page with their changes highlighted in yellow.</p>
<p>In the process of this exercise students register on Wikipedia and begin applying what they’ve discovered in their research to editing these theorists’ pages. Eventually, they often end up in a virtual dialogue with the scholars from across the globe, who function as self-appointed caretakers of these same pages. </p>
<h2>Not every change is accepted</h2>
<p>Not every change is accepted by the “community of caretakers” and, indeed, some will be undone. </p>
<p>Corrections of minor errors are universally embraced, while the addition of major sections (such as a summary explanation of a particularly important concept or work) are occasionally rejected in part or in whole. </p>
<p>If my students think the change they are proposing is an important one, I often encourage them to engage others online in a dialogue in order to convince others to keep the change. Wikipedia allows contributors to comment on the reasoning behind each change they submit (under the “History” tab) as well as start an ongoing conversation about various aspects of the page (under the “Talk” tab).</p>
<p>More typically, these “caretakers” embrace the opportunity to further improve, clarify, and re-write what the students are proposing until the additional material is transformed into more definitive improvements, and as a consequence the page evolves. </p>
<p>For example, if a student notices that <a href="en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Lukacs">Georg Lukacs’ page</a> is missing a section on his theory of “reification”, they may add a paragraph explaining its significance and practical use. While the paragraph is usually well-researched, it may not be particularly well-written, or it may include some misconceptions about the term that more senior scholars can see very clearly.</p>
<p>In this case one of the gatekeeper scholars will rewrite the paragraph in order to increase clarity and accuracy. The page will now include a thoughtful explanation of an important theory that was otherwise being overlooked.</p>
<h2>Students see impact of their research</h2>
<p>It is exciting for students to see how their research has an immediate impact on global Wikipedia readers. They receive quick feedback from others who share their interest in improving the quality of information available on a subject they care about, the field of sociology and how it is understood by the rest of the world. </p>
<p>And, along the way, they become better researchers, better writers, and maybe even better thinkers. Wikipedia adoption is easily one of the highlights of the course for most of them.</p>
<p>While the students are engaged in this work, we often have discussions in class about the strengths and weaknesses of Wikipedia. </p>
<p>We consider how to strategically utilize what it has to offer – a starting point for exploring a world of knowledge – while avoiding its many pitfalls. </p>
<p>We also take the opportunity to discuss what a radical model Wikipedia is proposing as it offers up the potential to democratize knowledge, expertise, and education.</p>
<p>But like all democracies, to achieve its full potential, it requires thoughtfully engaged citizens (or rather netizens) to contribute their own sense of what is important to a public sphere that will wither without them. </p>
<h2>The experiment takes us out of the ivory tower</h2>
<p>I find that this small but meaningful experiment allows students to combat their own occasional but not uncommon feelings of apathy, disengagement, and isolation. It also allows me to build another bridge between the walls of our own little ivory tower and people’s everyday, albeit online, lives. </p>
<p>This exercise is, in a sense, a way for students (and myself) to embrace a bit of idealism. They contribute time and energy to people they do not know in the hope that others will do the same, and with the greater goal of the whole world slowly but surely becoming better educated through a resource that is freely available to anyone with access to the Internet.</p>
<p>In this new age of information, we as academics need to redouble our efforts to reach out to communities, small and large, to reinvigorate public dialogue and to model to our students the behaviors we hope to see them adopt when they pursue their own careers. </p>
<p>Public sociologists, like myself, often feel a duty to both educate students about the variety of social problems that face us in the 21st century and to offer ways that students can participate in their resolution. </p>
<p>Wikipedia offers us more than just a straw man example of where the lazy student may turn when desperate for a quick source of information for a mediocre paper. Wikipedia gives us academics a way to engage the global public and to take responsibility for how our respective disciplines are seen in the eyes of the world. </p>
<p>It is also the case - at least from the experience of my class – that Wikipedia allows us to embrace new forms of teaching that will enhance the online skills students so desperately need to integrate with their own academic training.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39103/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ellis Jones does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>One academic’s experience on how Wikipedia can help students become better writers, better researchers and even better thinkers.Ellis Jones, Assistant Professor of Sociology, College of the Holy CrossLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.