Wikipedia:Writing Wikipedia Articles course/Round 4/Week 2

	Writing Wikipedia Articles: The Basics and Beyond
	a free six week course

Welcome to WIKISOO! Week of 4/5 March 2014 (Class #2)

Who am I to edit Wikipedia? Identity & collaboration

• Looking for the live Week 2 webinar (Tues/Wed)? Click here!
• Looking for the Week 1 class video? See the Week 1 page.
• Our email message introducing Week 2, in case you missed it!

Our second live session will take place on 4/5 March 2014 (click here to check the time in your region). We will start off this week by completing the general introduction to Wikipedia from Week 1.

We will then move into a survey of issues of expertise, credentials, anonymity, privacy, conflicts of interest (COI). What are Wikipedia's standards? What kinds of conflict arise around editor identity and behavior? How can they be avoided or resolved? We will also examine avenues for on-wiki collaboration.

We will look at both success stories and controversies in Wikipedia's history, and discuss best practices. This will lead into an exploration of how to find and work with Wikipedians who share your interests, or who can help you solve problems.

Live notes from each week's class are here: etherpad.wikimedia.org/WIKISOO4

Week 2 class outline

The first hour of class features a structured presentation, outlined below. Video of the session will be available in the upper right corner within 2 days after the class.

The remainder of the class session is an opportunity for students to get started on homework and ask questions.

• 0:00 Welcome and review of previous session; look at some user pages; take questions on homework from last week.
  • ACTIVITY: Leave a note on a fellow classmate's talk page.
  • ACTIVITY: Leave a note on the course talk page WT:OPEN.
• 0:10 Tour of an article that demonstrates a contributor with limited expertise building valuable content
• 0:25 Tour of an article/talk page demonstrating good behavior while under a conflict of interest
• 0:35 Tour of an article/talk page demonstrating bad COI behavior
• Quick intro: searching Wikimedia Commons
  • ACTIVITY: add an image to your user page.
• 0:40 Tour of the Manual of Style and the Featured Article review process
• 0:50 General intro of the final project and the badges.
  • ACTIVITY: Add "Signator" or "Registered Editor" badge to your user page (or userbox)
• 1:00 The remainder of the class session is for individual work and Q&A

Week 2 homework

Do:

• Read open educational resources article or any other article listed at the Communicate OER Content page. Consider what would make the article better -- how could the article better help you, or somebody else, learn about the topic?
• Comment on the article you chose above, or any article you plan to work on, on its talk page. Is it relevant/thorough? What would you like to change, add or delete? First, check the article's talk page, and see if anybody else has brought up similar issues. Then respond, or add your own comments, as appropriate. See here for suggestions about how to post your review: WP:Communicate OER Article Review
• Using your sandbox, Compile a short list of open education articles you might want to work on (see the Communicate OER Content page for ideas). List these in your sandbox or on your user page. (If you know exactly what article you want to work on, the list may be very short! Otherwise, choose and link to 3-5 articles.) This is important preparation for next week, when students will decide on an article for a final project.
• Continue making small edits to one or more Wikipedia articles: fix typos, sentence structure, add photographs; practice on your own. See Wikipedia:Community portal for a list of suggested pages to fix, categorized by the kind of work they need. (See Wikipedia:articles for improvement in particular!) If you like, keep a list of articles you've worked on on your user page!

Read:

• Article on Five Pillars (core policies) of Wikipedia
• Article on Wikipedia editing policy
• Article on Wikipedia conflict of interest
• Chap. 10: The Life Cycle of an Article, in How Wikipedia Works (PDF) (2008)

Week 2 extra credit

Do:

• Read about WikiProjects on Wikipedia; find one that interests you, and join it! Begin to monitor its talk page on at least a weekly basis, and start or participate in at least one discussion there. Communicate OER is ideal for students interested in Open Educational Resources- add yourself to the team page.)