User talk:Wadewitz/TeachingEssay

Topics

I have started two distinct topics: "construction of knowledge" and "discourse communities" and included some specific examples from my own experience and from Jon's essay, based on his WP:MMM project. There is little cohesion at the moment. Awadewit (talk) 04:14, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll be working on this more later today (Tuesday). (I did a tiny bit of revision in the beginning and left a half sentence where I was thinking.) I'm planning to try to add a section that considers a number of the more interesting published articles about Wikipedia across the curriculum (I want to try to write in the point I made at the panel about two different conversations -- reliability of Wikipedia as a source versus Wikipedia as a space for students to create and disseminate information for audiences ... with all the complications of that) and I'll add more information from my own teaching. Do we want to add a version of the bibliography I created? User: AEG English4994 —Preceding undated comment added 17:10, 25 May 2010 (UTC).

Sounds good - we should try to integrate our writing as much as possible, but I recognize how difficult this is in the time we have. I think adding the bibliography would be excellent. Awadewit (talk) 19:46, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Agree. I won't do a lot of rewriting. I think rewriting that paragraph was me imagining my way in. Also, if I'm going to add a section that shows how many people are writing about Wikipedia, I thought we should preview that some. I might need help with the bibliography in Wikipedia-style. I'm not very experienced at that yet. User: AEG English4994 —Preceding undated comment added 21:24, 25 May 2010 (UTC).

I can make it look fancy. :) Awadewit (talk) 22:30, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

But you know what, it occurs to me that I'm co-writing here as I'd co-write with co-authors I've written with (which may be too presumptuous), and I don't really have a sense of how you (or Jon and Robert) would like to co-write? So now that I'm working in this, I'm not sure the time is any problem (for me, at least), but I am a little unsure of how you'd like to co-write. Should I co-write through the whole thing or leave your sections and add new sections only? AEG English4994 (talk) 21:46, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

I think we should try to write in the wiki way - with lots of overwriting and revising of the other person's work. Perhaps I've just gotten into that habit, but that works better for me than trying to remember who "owns" which part of the text. I think you should be bold and revise anything you want, delete anything you want, and add anything you want! Awadewit (talk) 22:30, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Pictures

We should add some illustrations! Please suggest them here or just add them into the document. Awadewit (talk) 18:07, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Webcomics source

It would be nice to have a better source for the webcomics purge than Wikinews. Anyone want to help find one? Awadewit (talk) 19:53, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

How about this (page 3): http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2008/mar/20/the-charms-of-wikipedia/?page=3 AEG English4994 (talk) 03:15, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Excellent - thanks! Awadewit (talk) 17:08, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

My edits tonight

I didn't realize until now that I wasn't logged in (doing too much multi-tasking). But that was me editing. AEG English4994 (talk) 03:09, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

I figured. :) Awadewit (talk) 15:18, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Identifying who is the "I" teacher

In some places we use "User:x" to identify the teacher. But in some places we still have "I." I think we should probably consistently use "User:x," with one or the other of us -- just to make the evidence/anecdotes/courses clearer. Do you agree? AEG English4994 (talk) 14:00, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes - let's speak in the third-person. Awadewit (talk) 15:17, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

To do in the last hours

• Add section on collaboration, tenure, and academic credit

Could you put this (if you think it's good) as a note on the first sentence of the last paragraph of the "discourse communities" section (where you have "nook" etc.)? http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/07/20/credit Maybe the note sentence could say something like "Disciplines are beginning to rethink this bias..." It's about political science, but it also refers to the MLA we refer to later, so I think it could argue the expansion of coauthorship. Thanks. AEG English4994 (talk) 18:53, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks!--AEG English4994 (talk) 20:50, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

• Add material from Cummings' book on discourse communities

• I added something a bit different, but now there is more of an intro to the "Discourse communities" section (I saw you saw a need for this, too!) Awadewit (talk) 16:58, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

• Add images

• Ok, I've added some images. Let me know what you think. Awadewit (talk) 16:26, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Love Achebe and Twain. Also like the keyboard at intro. Feel unsure about the children in "discourse communities" section. What was your goal with that? AEG English4994 (talk) 16:53, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

I was looking for an image of people in a social environment. Would it help if I said in a caption that was a school? Or put some sort of caption like "Communities, such as this classroom in Afghanistan, develop their own discourse communities and students learn the norms [etc.] of a new one by working with Wikipedia." Awadewit (talk) 16:57, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Let me think about this question while I keep working. AEG English4994 (talk) 17:06, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Maybe a picture of a famous literary circle? Or people in it? Awadewit

I like the consensus pic. --AEG English4994 (talk) 20:50, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

(talk) 17:13, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

• Copyedit, copyedit, copyedit
• Review examples - please let me know what you think of the individual examples I chose. We can always choose others. I have a lot from my many years. I just chose some recent ones. Awadewit (talk) 16:57, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I was ignoring the examples for now because I knew we could still swap in/swap out this afternoon. I'd like to add in how much work some of my students did on the Woman Warrior article and somehow represent how much further it has come since this time last year. Any ideas about how to do that? Would it be worth it? Maybe we have enough examples? I saw you added links, thanks. AEG English4994 (talk) 17:06, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

That would be great. There are several ways to do that. Link to the article as it was when your students finished and link to it now. Quote extended bits of text. Etc. One of the most important things to demonstrate about Wikipedia is that it keeps getting better. Awadewit (talk) 17:10, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

I added this. It needs some reduction/copyediting, but I think it adds a useful example and leads to the closing of that section. --AEG English4994 (talk) 21:26, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

• How much linking into Wikipedia do we want to do?

• I'm thinking we should only link to Wikipedia when we are talking about it. Awadewit (talk) 02:32, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Names

Only I have my name on my userpage, so when I put in the author names, I only piped my real name. Others will need to make this choice for themselves. Awadewit (talk) 15:28, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I changed mine and I moved you to so-called "first author" (which is another irony we can talk about in our section on attribution/authorship, but you did organize us into the panel) AEG English4994 (talk) 15:42, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, I was going alphabetically by username. More democratic. :) We should definitely talk about that! That's funny. Awadewit (talk) 16:12, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Impressive!

"We wholly agree. In fact, Wadewitz is one of one of the top-ten producers of Wikipedia's featured articles." Who knew?! I'm impressed. :) AEG English4994 (talk) 18:10, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! Perhaps we should reword it in a less self-promotional manner? Awadewit (talk) 19:18, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Section editing

Please edit individual sections so that we don't edit conflict too much! Thanks! Awadewit (talk) 19:46, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Heh. Was doing so, in fact, but we seemed to be both on the postscript at the same time! Anyhow, I have to run to the airport now. Hope to have some time later. NB when we say midnight, is that Eastern Time? --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 20:00, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I just tweeted and asked (they should have made that clear in the CFP). Awadewit (talk) 20:57, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Title!

We need a title! I'm not very inventive when it comes to titles. I usually just combine "wiki" with something, like "Wikipportunities" or "Wiki-writing", when I talk about Wikipedia. Any thoughts? Awadewit (talk) 21:05, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Wiki-Hack (?) Wiki-Hacking (?) --AEG English4994 (talk) 22:51, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Do we want a subtitle? "Wiki-Hacking: Teaching with and being taught by Wikipedia"? Awadewit (talk) 01:18, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

I like the title as it is. But I like this title (teaching and being taught) too. Maybe it's your/our next piece? :) --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:06, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Last Lines

I also think we need to get Wikipedia into the last line somehow. I keep looking but can't figure out how...--AEG English4994 (talk) 21:08, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

I gave it a try. See what you think.--AEG English4994 (talk) 21:54, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Looks good to me. Awadewit (talk) 03:04, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Note

I couldn't get the darn note in. In fact, I got the biggest RED ERROR message I've ever seen on Wikipedia. So, would you put in a note for me that says this (or something like this): Anne Geller developed the English 4994 Wikipedia project as a participant in the St. John's University T3 grant program: http://www.stjohns.edu/academics/provost/resources/T3 or this is what's on my userpage if you like it better: My interest in Wikipedia was sparked in a faculty development program at St. John's University funded by T3, a United States Department of Education Strengthening Institutions Title III grant. --AEG English4994 (talk) 22:03, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Will do.

Thanks!--AEG English4994 (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Done. Awadewit (talk) 01:16, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Proofreading

I've asked some friends of mine to proofread the essay, so they might be editing. You might see the names User:WillowW or User:Geometry guy pop up in the history. Just wanted to alert everyone. The more collaboration the better! Awadewit (talk) 22:20, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks User:WillowW and/or User:Geometry guy! --AEG English4994 (talk) 22:30, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, WillowW - you're helping so much! Awadewit (talk) 01:16, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedians

My friend who read asks who are "wikipedians" so I think we need some notation, explanation, about this whole world of editors who identify themselves as associated with Wikipedia. And my friend notes the stark difference between "wikipedians" and the solitary scholar (which is what we want to point out), but I think we may need something that explicitly points to this contrast. --AEG English4994 (talk) 22:30, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

We've added a bit about who Wikipedians are. That's as far as we got, I'm afraid. Awadewit (talk) 02:23, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Looks good. --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:35, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Reliability of Wikipedia

My reader also suggests that we might be making too strong of a point that Wikipedia isn't a reliable source. I think we're just trying to turn readers' attention elsewhere -- to Wikipedia as a learning site -- but he says what's interesting is the inbetween-ness of Wikipedia, that it's being "baked," always becoming reliable and unreliable at the same time. It's not "reliable" or "unreliable" -- it's in the inbetween being generated. I think we say this. He wants more on this and doesn't want us to so strongly say it's "unreliable," although again, I think we did that to turn attention away from that argument. --AEG English4994 (talk) 22:44, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

So little of Wikipedia is reliable, though. And I don't think this is a point any of us wants to push, is it? The argument of this essay is not about why parts of Wikipedia might be reliable and fine to use. I think this is an entirely different essay. I'll put in a sentence to that effect. Awadewit (talk) 01:00, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

I've added a footnote. Awadewit (talk) 01:02, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I like it. I took off the "here." --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:03, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Done!

Well, I'm tired! There are only 58 minutes to go before the deadline. I've tweeted the link to the essay and emailed a link as well, explaining that the wiki format is integral to the essay. Awadewit (talk) 03:03, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! I was just looking at what you did when I took the break. Thanks for all the collaboration today and thanks for sending it. --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:05, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Bad link; I teach writing

Bad link to "Are We Ready to Use Wikipedia to Teach Writing?", but I fixed it... I too am very interested in this topic, as an educator... I sent you an email. • Ling.Nut 13:06, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks so much for fixing that! I'll respond to your email ASAP. Awadewit (talk) 00:07, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Let's Add a New Note

I think we should add a note to our piece linking to the new Wales interview in The Chronicle and turn attention to the usual debate in the Comments section and the course assignments he raises (the pirate versus Lih's assignments).

When he's talking about the pirate, I think he's talking about Edward_Owens and there's talk about it that continues into 2009. So I think a note in which we consider the Wikipedia policy on hoaxes ( "Don't Create Hoaxes") and show a hoax list alongside what the course professor says about the assignment in the Chronicle article cited on the Edward Owens page and/or here on a blog would be interesting. It's not the type of assignment we're writing about but it certainly links to our ideas about how knowledge is made and by whom. Thoughts? --AEG English4994 (talk) 20:22, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Good idea - I'll work on a draft now. Awadewit (talk) 02:45, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I added a version, along with a pretty strong statement about ethical responsibility. Let me know if you think that should be toned down a bit. Awadewit (talk) 03:03, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I toned it down a bit. Maybe too much? See what you think. --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:39, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

That's fine. I tend to be very opinionated. Rash youth? :) Awadewit (talk) 03:47, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Nice essay!

I'll be sure to cite in my next teach paper. My favorite argument is about why students should NOT work in workpages, but in mainspace ("Many instructors who design..."). I was recently thinking of how to explain this to another editor - now I can simply cite your essay :) Also, see my thoughts at Wikipedia_talk:Workpages#Workpages_are_dangerous_and_should_be_avoided - as far as I can tell, our current policies encourage the use of workspaces, where I fully agree with you they should discourage them. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:00, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! I read your piece in the International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning when I was first thinking about teaching with Wikipedia. So thanks for your piece too. --AEG English4994 (talk) 20:24, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Hey, Piotrus, nice to see you! Thanks for the link! Are you at Wikimania? I wish I were! We have a lot of policies that encourage sandboxes, but the more I work with them, the more I dislike them. :) The temptation is to sandbox for months, or even years! Awadewit (talk) 03:05, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Submitted version

Just to help us out - this is the version we had ready for the Hacking the Academy CFP. Everything else has been done after that. Awadewit (talk) 03:07, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Article traffic for June 2010 Awadewit (talk) 03:11, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

British Museum

I'm not sure where in the essay to put the news about the Wikipedian-in-Residence at the British Museum (see here) - thoughts? Awadewit (talk) 03:52, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I wrote it into the last line of the introduction. But it may disrupt that last sentence too much. Still, I think even if we only note it, that's where it should be. What do you think? --AEG English4994 (talk) 03:59, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Or, now that I look again, I do think that's disruptive, and maybe it should go at the beginning of the section about "What's Missing." As a note? --AEG English4994 (talk) 04:01, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

That's so funny! I thought about putting it in the exact same spot and then decided against it since the topic of the paragraph was about academic articles, but you did such a nice job of integrating it that I'm reconsidering my position. I'll read it again tomorrow and see what I think then. :) Awadewit (talk) 04:05, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I took it out! So we should both go to sleep. I think it goes in the "What's Missing" section, because that's the point, right? The British Museum wants to improve the coverage of their collections? --AEG English4994 (talk) 04:07, 12 June 2010 (UTC)