Talk:Wikikids

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Talk:Wikikids/2005 - 2009 (no talks in 2010-2012)

2013

Suggestion for next steps

http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AWikikids&diff=5237449&oldid=2004834

Hello, if you are still thinking about this proposal:

• Get some input from people involved in Vikidia-es and -it, wikikids.nl, and the Grundschulwiki. It would be hard to use the proposed name if the existing Dutch group didn't want to join.

• Describe a potential schedule for a migration to WMF hosting (and any merging of related sites: would they have interlanguage links?). Identify a technical contact. See the history of the Wikivoyage page and the OmegaWiki page for examples. –SJ talk  20:55, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

For children or by children?

Hello, folks! I've read this page and it sounds very reasonable: adults must help to ensure the quality of the content, but allowing kids to write as well is essential for their educational process.

So, my proposal comes from NationStates, an online videogame where players govern their countries. They have school subsites, where students of a specific school or class play their game in a closed environment. This helps the teacher to have better control of what happens.

Of course I don;t propose to close things, Wikimedia projects must be open. But in my view, it would be interesting to give professors a space where they can carry their activities without interference from others. It's more or less like Wikipedia in Education subsites (which I only guess what they are). So, once the students learn enough, the professor can encourage them to contribute to the main site.

Good luck with the project! --NaBUru38 (talk) 16:16, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks !

There is an mw:Extension:Education Program, but I don't know it well...

I would say that we first care of the wiki's community life, and that the work done by a school is often quite separate from the regular users, because each pupil (sadly) most commonly come for a single work. I think that we should share practice in those school participation, that are a big work for the teachers. But organising their activity with or without interference with the community is firstly their choice and it depends on several things... So I don't know if and how they would be something useful to do like this. Astirmays (talk) 20:49, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

I meant that professors should have the option to do their activities in a closed space, to join in a local group, or in public. I didn't mean to prevent them from working in public. Bye! --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:57, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

vs. Wikipedia Simple English

How does this compare with Wikipedia in Simple English? Is Simple English just dumbed-down and not exactly aimed towards children? If we changed the name from Simple English to Wikikids would anyone doubt it was aimed towards children instead? LockeShocke 23:22, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I don´t know anything about Simple english, please read my answer to Angelas question above. I think, theres a way to use simple english as a base for english Wikikids as I lined out, but it seems to be not the same. And simple english is just one language, my personal interest is not the english language, it´s the german one where I will help starting Wikikids and there is no simple german (or any other simple language) Wikipedia right now. Greetings, -- Necrophorus 23:50, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I have been making a few edits on the simple.wiki an in fact I am not allowed to edit the en.wiki because of my (flagrant expression we'll say) views on how it should be restrained in some ways, particularly ways in which a wiki for kids, therefore I appreciate the simple.wiki very much being guidelined for kids and guidelined for easy reading etc. Only thing is, it doesnt get the rush of contributors that other projects have. A kids.wiki would certainly get such a rush but in the meantime I would suggest that members of this project should be already contributing to the simple.wiki as this is exactly what simple.wiki is for and it is greatly underdeveloped. Anything you make there could be a template for a kids.wiki and although I have not been a kid for some time myself, simple.wiki seems to be populated mostly by teenagers (perhaps needing guidance :D), so, even if you are not approved for this project, please start your work on the simple.wiki, now! G Luck RTG 22:42, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

The Simple wikipedia is not for kids due to the content issue. 69.120.135.108 22:50, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

The problem is not mainly about the adult content issue because, browsing through specific categories, it's an easy challenge to delete such entries as soon as the fork Simple ---> Wikikids is created.

No! the main problem is about those too many articles actually accessible inside Simple not improving when an exotic robot was allowed in January 2013 to create so many French communes ; my suggestion is to start with only the 1000 most viewed Simple entries focusing on the ultimate goal of 2000 which has been already achieved in the first ever wikipedia junior project. ONaNcle (talk) 06:13, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Onancle why do you insist on attacking simple.wiki. No bot was created in January 2013 to create articles on french communes. What was discussed in January was deleting all of them. That being said don't see a heck of a lot of difference in this project from simple.wiki which is already aimed at children. -Djsasso (talk) 18:31, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

@Djsasso, If ONaNcle is the one I know on the french Wikipedia, you shouldn't mind too much about him.

Then you may be right that a great part of SEWP fits to children. However, it is not labeled "for children", there is really no consensus it should be labelled so, and one example of what it carries along is that when you look for "encyclopedia for children" on Google, you won't find SEWP whereas when you look for "encyclopedie pour enfants" you do find Vikidia first.

Still a great part of the content of SEWP would fit to a Wikikids (which part I can't say precisely) and it would be a pity to write it again. Astirmays (talk) 23:09, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

WikiKids in the Netherlands

There already is, for seven years now, WikiKids in the Netherlands. It's doing reasonably well, we think. We are a group of teachers that started WikiKids and are supported by Kennisnet who take care of the hosting. It's interesting to talkk about WikiKids as a sisterproject of Wikimedia. But what would that mean for us exactly? Apart from the fact that our connect would be moved to other servers? Gerarddummer (talk) 08:06, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Hi, thank you for posting here. I don't mean to bring a definite answer, other reactions are welcomed. However, it brought me to find this page : Wikifederalism which tells about should the autonomy to govern itself that each local wiki should have. By the way, I wrote on the page Wikikids/Review of current existing wikis akin to Wikikids#Vikidia : [Vikidia promoter/community] "expect that their project will keep its autonomy (in the same way that every Wikimedia project has its) and will not be altered by some restrictions to arise".

They may be quite a few technical benefits among which bot operated tasks that would be possible to let do (as long as you give them permission for it). The benefits may be a better coordination, not only with other Wikikids but more with Wikipedia in Dutch.

Would you check and complement Wikikids/Review of current existing wikis akin to Wikikids as for WikiKids.nl ? I personally know it, but not perfectly either. Do you feel that WikiKids.nl and how this project is expounded are much alike or that there is some difference ? Astirmays (talk) 11:50, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Talk:Wikikids/For children or by children ?

Copy from http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Wikikids/For_children_or_by_children_%3F&oldid=5385854

Hello, I would like to suggest to concentrate on the creation of a content wiki. The goal is to create content suitable for readers. Further educational goals (editing children) can get in the way. I saw a wiki with articles written by children, and they actually look like that. For children a closed school wiki seems to be a better idea.Ziko (talk) 21:50, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

The Dutch WikiKids has both purposes: learn how to edit on a wiki and profide suitable information for children. Both purposes are important, in my opinion. Gerarddummer (talk) 09:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

What is the best for the reader, would you say? And what about the hostility common on a wiki? Ziko (talk) 10:59, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The best for the reader is to realize that a wiki is filled with information from individuals. That's part of his digital literacy, I think. Maybe you should take a look on WikiKids and find out for yourself how much hostility there is on WikiKids. Gerarddummer (talk) 09:22, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

@Ziko:

• About the "hostility common on a wiki" I would say that there is certainly much less hostility on such a wiki than in the average schoolyard... Then I would quote Andrés Monroy-Hernández in Supporting an Online Community for Kids "At the same time, I would argue that a little bit of drama is healthy for any online community."
• about "the best for the reader", there is some arguments on Wikikids/For children or by children ?. Another one I think of, is that when a child starts an article, be it short and deficient, this child would typically take the subject seriously. Therefore an older editor that will correct and expand it will be led to continue to take the subject seriously. Although paradoxical, children participation may prevent from infantilization (which I think is not that much avoided on b:Wikijunior...) Astirmays (talk) 22:13, 20 April 2013 (UTC)