Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Stanford University/Journey to Center of Earth (Winter 2022)
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- Course name
- Journey to Center of Earth
- Institution
- Stanford University
- Instructor
- Simon Klemperer
- Wikipedia Expert
- Ian (Wiki Ed)
- Subject
- Solid Earth Geosciences
- Course dates
- 2022-01-03 00:00:00 UTC – 2022-03-17 23:59:59 UTC
- Approximate number of student editors
- 24
Earth, from the inner core to crustal features created by plate tectonics, as an interconnected set of dynamic systems. In this course we cover the 6371-km distance from Earth’s surface to the center of its core and back again, learning how the different parts of our planet interact. This course focuses on fundamental geological and geophysical observations of Earth, and the laboratory experiments and computer models we use to understand and interpret them. How do we know what we know? What do seismology, high-pressure physics, gravity, magnetic fields, and rocks tell us about Earth’s formation and evolution?
Timeline
Week 1
- Course meetings
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- Tuesday, 4 January 2022 | Thursday, 6 January 2022
- In class - Introduction to the Wikipedia assignment
Welcome to your Wikipedia assignment's course timeline. This page guides you through the steps you'll need to complete for your Wikipedia assignment, with links to training modules and your classmates' work spaces.
You will work on 2 wikipedia assignments here -- one very short bio for a scientist as a warm-up and one complete wiki page as your final project for this course.
Your course has been assigned a Wikipedia Expert. You can reach them through the Get Help button at the top of this page.
Resources:
- Editing Wikipedia, pages 1–5
- Evaluating Wikipedia
All the "Training" and "Exercise" modules are provided by Wikipedia; but we show an Assignment Due Date for each because it is important that you compete these on-line modules.
Note: please check syllabus https://canvas.stanford.edu/courses/149645 for schedule of Wikipedia assignments and exercises. (Also of course for homework schedule and readings.)
- Assignment - Get started on Wikipedia
Create an account and join this course page, using the enrollment link your instructor sent you. (Because of Wikipedia's technical restraints, you may receive a message that you cannot create an account. To resolve this, please try again off campus or the next day.)
- Assignment - How to edit; What images am I allowed to use?
Finding images may prove to be a hang-up for many/most of you, because "most of the time, images you find online aren't approved for use on Wikipedia". Now I realize why some of the Wikipedia images seem so marginally useful, and this is why I've added this training module. I'm also posting a complete guide online. In principle, if you can persuade someone to release the image you want to use, Wikipedia makes it trivially easy for them to assign a license. What may be less easy however is to get the Wikipedia monitors to accept we've done this correctly.
- Milestones
This week, everyone should have a Wikipedia account, and completed the first wiki trainings.
You should also read the article about Jessica Wade on Canvas. We're using her efforts - to add biographies of under-represented scientists to Wikipedia - as inspiration for your initial wikipedia article. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendy_Mao as an example. Your contribution doesn't even need to be this long.
Week 2
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 11 January 2022 | Thursday, 13 January 2022
- Assignment - Homework #1
The first of four problem sets will be handed out Tuesday 01/11, due the following Tuesday. Note: all four JTCE homeworks are due Tuesday, in class, on paper.
- Assignment - Continue Wikipedia training; select a scientist for whom to write a bio.
You may choose any noteworthy scientist who does not yet have a Wikipedia page. You may accept the "Jessica Wade" challenge to identify a scientist from an under-represented group. Or choose a scientist you respect. But wikipedia requires your choice be "notable" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(academics) Please also read through this page when writing about a living person. I'm thrilled if you have your own ideas; and I'm happy to offer advice. But I do not want the search to be a time-sink, so perhaps the easiest route is to search the roster of the Natonal Academy of Sciences, or Fellows of the American Geophysical Union, etc., to find a target. My quick scan suggests that in the Stanford Geophysics Department alone, academicians Amos Nur and Paul Segall lack pages; AGU Fellows Beroza, Ellsworth, Klemperer, Zebker lack pages. All elderly white males of course, but that's the accident of birth.
Some more names for your consideration:
- Milestones
This week, everyone will pick a scientist for the short-bio wiki page and start drafting. You will submit your named choice via canvas by 1/16
Week 3
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 18 January 2022 | Thursday, 20 January 2022
- Assignment - Homework #1 due, Homework #2 Assigned
The second of four problem sets will be handed out Tuesday, due the following Tuesday
- Assignment - Complete training; Draft your scientist-biography
This week, everyone will upload a picture to wikipedia (to their sandbox) and submit their biography page for instructor review/approval.
Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have questions using the Get Help button at the top of this page.
Resource: Editing Wikipedia, pages 7–9
- Milestones
This week, everyone will upload a picture to wikipedia and submit their completed biography for review.
Week 4
- Course meetings
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- Tuesday, 25 January 2022 | Thursday, 27 January 2022
- Assignment - Homework #2 due Homework #3 Assigned
The third of four problem sets will be handed out Tuesday, due the following Tuesday
- Assignment - Submit possible topics for term paper/Wiki page
Select *three* possible topics and write one paragraph on the importance and/or interest of each. These are not your Wikipedia topics, but they help you begin to focus, help us to provide individual guidance; and allow us to recognize potential overlap/duplication. Probably your Wikipedia page (and final presentation for grad students) will lie within one of the three topic areas you write about today. Many of these topics are too broad for a Wikipedia page for this class, but these ideas can help you figure out what most interests you.
We greatly prefer you to write your own original article. If you can find a relevant topic on which your are doing or have done research, or already written a term paper, that's great - you'll do less work to achieve a higher standard. But there may be good reasons why instead you identify an existing page that you believe needs major improvement.
We are here to help refine your choices, which typically means helping you check your topic doesn't already exist in Wikipedia by another name; narrowing the topic to make it tractable in five weeks; or broadening the topic to make it appropriate for Wikipedia.
Previously in this class, students created pages on topics of regional geology; volatile cycling; seismic methods; each of earth's main layers (lithosphere, mantle, core):
Antarctic volcanoes // Geological origins of East African Rift
Deep Earth water cycle // Deep Carbon Cycling
Strength of Earth's Lithosphere // Lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary
Mantle Oxidation State // Lower mantle // Core-mantle differentiation
Innermost Inner Core // Inner Core Super-Rotation // Age of inner core // Planetary cores
Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 6
- Assignment - Publish your biography
By the end of this week, please move your biography to the Wikipedia Mainspace. Congratulations! You are a published Wikipedia author. Be sure to boast to your friends and relatives. If your bio is of a living scientist, maybe you also want to let them know?
- Milestones
Week 5
- Course meetings
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- Tuesday, 1 February 2022 | Thursday, 3 February 2022
- Assignment - Homework #3 due Tuesday
- Assignment - [Final wiki page] Refine/Finalize topic/ Find sources
By now you have had our feedback on your choice of topic. After completing this weeks topic-choice exercise, write a series of bullets that are the outline of your planned page; list at least three potential sources; identify at least three figures you might want to include.
This week, everyone will have a final wiki page to work on and a full list of references/sources.
Week 6
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 8 February 2022 | Thursday, 10 February 2022
- Assignment - Homework #4 assigned
The last of four problem sets will be handed out Tuesday, due the following Tuesday
- Milestones
Everyone has begun writing their article drafts and have ideas of key figures/images for the wiki page. Please seek help as needed. No need to turn in any work this week.
Week 7
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 15 February 2022 | Thursday, 17 February 2022
- Assignment - Homework #4 due
- Assignment - [Final wiki page] First, preliminary draft due
This draft must be complete enough – i.e. including all the disussion topics and facts that you expect to be in your final article – that a fellow student can meaningfully comment on these aspects. The better prepared your first draft, the more useful the comments will be.
This preliminary draft should be in your sandbox.
Week 8
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 22 February 2022 | Thursday, 24 February 2022
- Assignment - [Final wiki page] Review your colleague's work BY WEDNESDAY NIGHT
You will be assigned a draft article written by a classmate, and expected to provide the constructive and helpful review in the same detail as you hope to receive on your article.
You will write your review in the Talk page associated with the Sandbox page you are reviewing.
- Assignment - Training
- Peer review an article
- Assignment - Respond to your peer review, revise your work, move to sandbox
You will have feedback from another student and possibly other Wikipedians. Consider their suggestions, decide whether it makes your work more accurate and complete, and edit your draft to make those changes.
You will make changes to your article in your sandbox; but you must also write a short one-paragraph reflection/response to the review that you received, in the Talk page associated with your sandbox.
If you page is not already in your sandbox, please move it there.
Resources:
- Editing Wikipedia, pages 12 and 14
- Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have any questions.
- Milestones
Every student has finished reviewing their assigned articles, making sure that every article has been reviewed. Students start revising their drafts.
Week 9
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 1 March 2022 | Thursday, 3 March 2022
- Assignment - [wiki page] Final (Sandbox) draft due; Continue improving your article
Exercise
Now's the time to revisit your text and refine your work. You may do more research and find missing information; rewrite the lead section to represent all major points; reorganize the text to communicate the information better; or add images and other media.
Polish your work. Format your article to match Wikipedia's tone and standards. Remember to contact your Wikipedia Expert at any time if you need further help!
Everyone should have their final wiki page in their sandbox, ready for a second review.
Week 10
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 8 March 2022 | Thursday, 10 March 2022
- Assignment - Begin moving your work to Wikipedia
Now that you've improved your draft based on others' feedback, it's time to move your work live - to the "mainspace."
Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 13
- Assignment - Finalize your article; prepare for the Final session
Respond to your second peer review by improving your article: You will have feedback from different student and possibly other Wikipedians. Consider their suggestions, decide whether it makes your work more accurate and complete, and edit your draft to make those changes. As you strive to write with economy, clarity and precision, if in doubt "the reviewer is right": your reviewer sees your work with fresher eyes than your own!
It's the final week to develop your article, that will be read and graded on 03/16 immediately after the Final.
- Read Editing Wikipedia page 15 to review a final check-list before completing your assignment.
- Don't forget that you can ask for help from your Wikipedia Expert at any time!
Graduates (200-level enrollees) prepare your presentation.
Undergrads (100-level enrollees) write an informal reflection on your Wikipedia experience (< 1 page) addressing some or all of:
· Critiquing articles: What did you learn about Wikipedia during the article evaluation? How did you approach critiquing the article you selected for this assignment? How did you decide what to add to your chosen article?
· Summarizing your contributions: include a summary of your edits and why you felt they were a valuable addition to the article. How does your article compare to earlier versions?
· Peer Review: Include information about the peer review process. What did you contribute in your review of your peers article? What did your peers recommend you change on your article?
· Feedback: Did you receive feedback from other Wikipedia editors, and if so, how did you respond to and handle that feedback?
· Wikipedia generally: What did you learn from contributing to Wikipedia? How does a Wikipedia assignment compare to other assignments you've done in the past? How can Wikipedia be used to improve public understanding of our field/your topic? Why is this important?
- Assignment - Exercise
- Self-nominate yourself for stardom!
Week 11
- Course meetings
-
- Tuesday, 15 March 2022 | Thursday, 17 March 2022
- In class - Final - Wednesday 03/16, 08
- 30–11:30
In-class presentation (200-level enrollees)
Active engagement and questioning (everyone, but especially undergrads)
- Milestones
Everyone should have finished all of the work they'll do on Wikipedia, and be ready for grading.