User:Mu301/Wikiversity

This page is a draft of improvements to be made to Wikiversity. The plan is to use these quotes as references for text that describes the activity and mission of Wikiversity. The following material was originally from [1].

Applicability to Modern Learning

Wikiversity is an innovative project applying the popular internet collaboration software WikiMedia[2] to growing virtual learning communities. In addition to the bsic wiki software participants have been experimenting IRC channels, instant messaging, and email to enhance the learning environment. Enormous potential exists should the project prove that distributed teams of learners can successfully support and reinforce each others efforts via the internet.

Quotes

"Again, on use of electronic media, David Topps of the Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM) discussed how a new medical curriculum introduced in 2005 to the NOSM found online medical resources crucial to the program. His session covered the use of open and free software options for students such as Wikiversity which can support collaborative note taking and generate widely accessible shared information. The use of wikis, through sites such as http://en.wikiversity.org, personal blogs, online library services such as www.librarything.com and online bookmark services such as http://del.icio.us were discussed. Students had found these sites useful means of locating and sharing information."

"In other realms, supporters of Wikipedia, an online and open source encyclopedia, have proposed the creation of a collaborative Wikiversity, which could serve as a repository of educational materials, online courses, and possibly even offer college degrees (Foster, 2005). The Wikipedia site was launched in 2001 and since then has posted more than 2.5 million encyclopedic entries in 10 different languages. Though still evolving in validity and credibility, such programs demonstrate that there may be other means to provide free educational materials in a community of knowledge sharers. These new models are in synch with a systemic shift toward an education focused more on what students truly need to know and how they can learn it (Keller, 2001), goaded by market-driven employers discounting the value of a diploma, in favor of the more desirable actual competencies a student has learned (Levine, 2003)."

"Wikipedia is already the first port of call for many web users, and its functionality and inclusions continue to grow rapidly. Its associated web sites may also prove useful. Wikibooks (http://en.wikibooks.org) offers open content text books. Wikiversity (www.wikiversity.org) is described as “a centre for the creation and use of free learning materials”. Wikisource (www.wikisource.org) is a free library of documents."

"This article is not meant to be a step-by-step tutorial but rather a call for consideration and further study of Wikis in statistics classrooms. However we briefly discuss some issues of application and include some advice to teachers on how to use Wikis (Section 7 and 8). Many resources (e.g., books, tutorial, Websites) are available nowadays that provide detailed instructions on how to use Wikis, how to get a Wiki, what the options are, issues of security in Wikis, good examples of Wikis in classrooms, etc. (e.g., Leuf & Cunningham 2001; Richardson 2006; Wikiversity, http://en.wikiversity.org). In sum, this article attempts to make a convincing case for the use of Wiki to support collaborative learning experiences for students in the statistics classroom."

"A promising medium is the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC); when used by the teacher, it is called One Laptop Per Teacher (OLPT). This paper proposes structure and content for in-service training of teachers in the use of OLPC, using the OLPT. With the OLPC pupils build each other up by co-operating and collaborating, using the mesh networking facilities built into the OLPC. And this must also be a key point for teachers, building each other up by co-operating and collaborating using the Web. Wikiversity was used as the repository to keep the current, cooperatively composed, master copy of material prepared by the community for the course for in-service teachers. OLPT Link at Wikiversity inserted here by editor The in-service teachers are supported by material provided under the LP, and as part of preparing this paper, the authors created a framework for the material that will be provided in the collaborative learning group. The repository has been called "Collaborate and Create In-Service", and this course is at Wikiversity."

"The Wikipedia website has a very large user and author base and enormous content that increases by the day, thus testifying the success of wiki technology. Wikipedia’s coverage on math topics is also considerable. There are, for instance, a number of articles with category “Differential calculus”.^2 Yet, there are other wiki resources on differentiation. Wikibooks, the open-content textbooks collection, also features a book on calculus^3, whereas Wikiversity, a community for the creation and use of free learning materials and activities, has a School of Mathematics that offers, for instance, an introductory course to differentiation.^4"

"Finally, however, an even larger challenge may yet lie ahead for educational institutions. As the experience in other sectors of the knowledge economy has shown, produsers are rarely content with working as contributors of content, information, and knowledge into conventionally structured knowledge industries; rather, in areas as diverse as software development, journalism, encyclopaedic publishing, and creative practice (and well beyond, though as yet less visibly so) their collaborative efforts have led to the development of structures which are parallel to and in competition with the traditional leaders of these industry sectors. It is likely that in the education sector, too, growing trends towards produsage will lead to experimentation with the establishment of entirely produsage-based educational institutions. While for now, absent official accreditation, such projects may still appear esoteric and fanciful, the establishment of the ‘Wikiversity’ as an official project of the Wikimedia Foundation (also in association with the Wikibooks project for the collaborative authoring of textbooks) could be seen as a portent of future developments (Wikiversity 2007)."

"Sister projects to Wikipedia coordinated by the Wikimedia Foundation include Wikibooks, mentioned above, as well as Wikispecies, Wikiquote, Wikinews, Wikiversity, Wiktionary, Wikisource, Commons, and Meta-Wiki In terms of resources specifically intended for educational audiences, Wikimedia Commons is a free online repository of over 1,000,000 media files to which anyone can contribute or learn from (Wikicommons, 2007). The objects found at Wikimedia commons are searchable by topic, type, license, author, and source. Free drawings, animations, maps, photos, painting, music, speeches, and much other content can be found there. In addition to Wikimedia Commons, Wikiversity seems somewhat similar with its goal of providing free learning materials and activities as well as being a social organization “that is dedicated to learning, teaching, research and service” (Wikiversity, 2007). Given it was approved by the Wikimedia Foundation in August 2006, Wikiversity is a recent phenomenon, and, hence, it is difficult to predict its’ ultimate growth and outcome. The research possibilities, however, are conceivably enormous and link to those currently underway such as that exploring MIT’s OpenCourseWare project and learning objects at MERLOT and Connexions (Lorenzo, 2006)."

"A number of universities have begun looking at wiki software for use as an information source and for e-learning. One useful idea tried out by Manchester University is the wikispectus [21], an alternative prospectus. A wikia (a collection of freely-hosted wiki communities using the same MediaWiki software) of known university wikis [22] is also worth visiting, but currently covers some countries, such as Germany, much better than others. Other useful wikis aimed at the education sector include Meatballwiki [23], a community of active practitioners striving to teach each other how to organise people using online tools, and Wikiversity [24], a community for the creation and use of free learning materials and activities. Wikiversity is a multi-dimensional social organisation dedicated to learning, teaching, research and service. Both services have built up an established community of users."

"Indeed we can see examples of projects that would be rather impossible before the advent of wiki technology. J. Moxley from University of South Florida created one of the best known academic teaching wikis, the TeachingWiki:“Teaching Wiki aspires to be a community for college-level faculty, particularly faculty teaching rhetoric and composition. However, as we invoke the wiki way here, we invite all college faculty and instructors to be wikiteachers with us. Feel free to use this site to reflect on teaching practices, cite resources and provide lesson plans.” This project is quite similar to Wikiversity, one of the newest endeavors of the Wikimedia Foundation (a non-profit NGO responsible for support of Wikipedia)."

"Online businesses such as Friendster or LinkedIn offer many-to-many communications systems (multiparticipant virtual worlds) and forums for interaction, which are already used by students outside of the classroom. Such electronic environments are new pedagogical spaces that can further educational goals. In the book Smart Mobs, Howard Rheingold advances the idea that many-to-many venues are not only a new form of communication but a potential revolution in social organization based on “communities of shared interest.”27 Free textbooks, for example, are available online at Wikibooks, and many complimentary texts can be found at the Gutenberg Web site, Gutenberg.org. MIT OpenCourseWare is a free and open educational resource for faculty, students, and self-learners around the world.28 The project Opentheory applies ideas of free software to the development of texts as users of the site improve on the text submissions of others.29 Wikiversity facilitates learning through the Wiki real-time logging format.30 A Wiki is a type of server application that allows people to create and edit Web-page content using Web browsers. The Web-based and open submission encyclopedia Wikipedia will eventually become more comprehensive than traditional encyclopedias. Despite the fact that these tools were welcomed with hyped enthusiasm and are fairly easy to use, many still find it too much of a burden to give them a try."

"In a time when foundations are cutting back their financial support of colleges and universities, and when many government are having to reduce funs, Mary Marcy (2003)--reporting that the financial crunch may be just beginning-- asks what can be done. She calls for "a comprehensive vision beyond the objectives of individual colleges" and for new ideas that are more than `pockets of innovation.' Funding of education for all, including the developing world, must involve much standardization for economy in technologies. For example, Norris et al. (2003) propose "low-cost knowledge management tools for all persons" and "low-cost "approaches to knowledge object creation, re-purposing and reuse." Put simply, they say, "the cost of digital content/context needs" must "drop by an order of magnitude" and it is difficult even to discuss how and what, until there is a global learning planning system." Note Wikiversity: <http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Main_Page>."