Wikikids/Excerpt from the 2015 Strategy/Community consultation

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This is an excerpt from the 2015 Strategy/Community consultation on the "Wikipedia for children" idea.


75.157.63.115[edit]

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-02-28

Response by 75.157.63.115 I think Wikipedia is very helpful. And that you should make your site more appealing to the younger generation; by putting more bright colours like neon yellow on your pages and your home page.

We really appreciate input on what would make the site more accessible, and we have design researchers on staff who are willing to look at exactly this. Thank you! We're glad you find it helpful.GYoung (WMF) (talk) 01:26, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@GYoung (WMF): occasionally discussions come up about making a "Wikipedia for kids". If anyone in Design is tracking that idea, this suggestion about friendly coloring would be good to track there. I think that kid-friendly coloring would be a great idea for that project. You also might suggest to the designers that they could make a brightly colored skin for the existing Wikipedias. --Pine✉ 03:50, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

71.181.235.64[edit]

Response by 71.181.235.64

71.181.235.64's thoughts on question 2[edit]

Make the site more colorful to attract the eye if you cant afford that I'm sure you can make a fundraiser.

To answer the second question first, I'd like to go over two related ideas: the protection of children and curation. As far as I'm able to tell, there are no limits to things that can be searched. I don't know if any products available as third party filter Wikipedia content, but in their absence, there is far too much adult content freely available for children to see, some with entirely adult-only imagery. While I believe that if parents can raise their children the way they see fit, I also believe there should be an opt-in or opt-out option to filter adult content. Children do not have any particular need to see descriptions or pictures of sex acts or genital anatomy. Once children reach learning about reproduction in school, general graphical depictions should suffice, rather than an open-license picture. This also allows for a major opportunity for growth in the curation of articles targeted for children. With proper content controls and properly sourced materials, Wikipedia could be a really excellent source of secondary information. At some point, the students need to read for a general idea and start reading the primary material/articles. As long as companies are willing to honor Wikipedia's code of neutral and factual writing or willing to make general gifts for children's content, or possibly able to make mention of their gifts, there is a massive opportunity for soliciting funds to support the effort. The moral high ground is always defensible, and most likely very profitable. Good curation of the subjects that children generally learn in school, written to the level of specificity that is considered grade-appropriate, coupled with the interrelations of subjects that are inherent to children's learning, could be far more robust through Wikipedia than other sources. I did a very basic report on beavers in the 3rd grade. What information did I need? Basic anatomical features like teeth and tail, oiled skin, diet, range of habitat, dam-building. The inherent interactivity of Wikipedia (and all hyperlinked content) would have been far more entertaining and engaging as a learning tool than just my textbook, but it was the 80s. Sprynet and 14400 baud modems would have been the stuff of science fiction.

Thank you for your thoughtful comment. There was a proposal in the past to put in place an image filter to help users filter out legal content that they nevertheless did not want to see. It was received with mixed results. I like the idea of Wikipedia for children. Some ideas that are out there include Wikipedia for Schools and Wikipedia (Simple) with SafeSearch. I greatly appreciate your taking the time to share this with us. GeoffBrigham (WMF) (talk) 01:35, 24 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

To answer the first question, multilingual translation of well-written educational articles will always benefit the next billion users, because literacy is so important in the developing world. Also, well-written articles in English will always benefit those looking to learn English. Properly calibrated grade levels would be of a great benefit to adult learners who need a quick and reliable metric for comprehension and sentence length/complexity. At the same time, this would be a really good test of the real-world applicability of tools like the Flesch-Kincaid grade level.

Basically, what I am proposing is:

  • 1. Write articles somewhat redundantly with a writing level and content-specific level appropriate to K-12 learners at each grade.
    • Re 1. Just a thought on the first one. First (sorry for the distant start, I'll go to the heart of the matter soon), I love the approach in which Wikipedia explains how to work with it by saying what it is and what it is not. That adds much clarity. It states that it is an encyclopaedia and that, therefore, it gathers knowledge (in the modern sense of the word, an "encyclopaedia" is a storage of knowledge). It would benefit us, if it also stated more clearly what knowledge is in the Wikipedian sense. For many people, especially perhaps outside the Western culture, knowledge is not facts, it is words. I.e. words matter for knowledge as such: elements of style, elements of in-article argument, and also what I might call artifacts of human language. Human language is not well-suited for describing facts, it prefers to reflect our work with facts (why ought you to agree with me? because you see that languages have lots of really different ways of pointing out the same facts; I have also the impression that English may be not the most representative example of this phenomenon), which is why we, in our life, usually refer to facts very ambiguously, as the main thing, that we refer to, is our work with facts and our personal actions with facts. So, the introductory pages should present readily an explanation what knowledge is, in Wikipedia's understanding. Such explanation should also naturally lead to the idea (which you mention) that language of articles needs to be as simple as possible, and "style-free". Wikipedian pages are not works of authorship, they are rather collections of independent facts of objective realities (a concept which may be very difficult to explain correctly, by the way, as it is very artificial), which facts can be safely added or removed without breaking the entire article. Why realities in plural? Because there is e.g. the physical reality in which such relationships of concepts are possible, there are historical realities in which other kinds of concept relationships are possible (according to the historical concept framework in use: e.g. someone might say the concept of causality is not factual in history, someone else could disagree), and so on. This structure (a storage of independent facts, written in different sections of the article for ease of use) ought to be absolutely clear to contributors, they ought to know how an article is different from an essay (even if, say, a given language has a habit to use the same word for both). I developed this thought from Wikipedian Abiyoyo's contribution, which I could find again if you like (it was written in Russian though and concerned a problem in the Russian section that had been discussed for long time). IN SHORT: in introductory pages, please pay some attention of the reader (often not very attentive) to what knowledge is, per Wikipedia. That would effectuate also the motion that you proposed. - 92.100.171.195 19:24, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2. Hyperlink appropriate related subjects as the grade level calls for it, and possibly add a few. Public school children will be well served to learn formal reasoning skills.
  • 3. Get a worldwide effort going so that quality pages are written in a local language and a number of diplomatic-use languages, like French and English.
  • 4. Offer pages written at a specific grade level to act as a real-world test of our measurement tools for people learning languages, especially English as a second language.
I think that caring for language learning (whatever languages will be most-sought-for in the next decades) is not a task for Wikipedia. At all. It ought not to care of it. Do little, yet do it well. - 92.100.171.195 19:24, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • 5. Implement parental controls to limit content available to child users of Wikipedia.
  • 6. Allow separate funding of the effort to gain additional funding sources.


Thanks for the thoughtful ideas for our consideration. Here are some high level responses:
  • 1 This is a good idea. We do have Simple English, but, as far as I know, we do not have that in other languages.
  • 2 I think I need to hear a bit more to understand this, if you have time.
  • 3 This does happen to some extent. We do have featured articles, and they are often translated into languages including French.
  • 4 Creative. Thanks.
  • 5 I understand the concern. I did provide a link to some alternatives in this area. I wonder if that addresses your concern.
  • 6 There may be added administrative costs. But I see your point.
Many thanks for your input and willingness to participate. GeoffBrigham (WMF) (talk) 01:47, 24 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
We do have Wikipedia equivalents for children in other languages, yet not as WMF projects. It was actually discussed before as a Wikimedia sister project on Wikikids. The most successful and developed are WikiKids in Dutch, Vikidia in french (one million of unique visitors a month now). Vikidia also exists in other languages as English ( http://blog.wikimedia.fr/vikidia-in-english-opens-today-lets-build-a-children-wiki-encyclopedia-6400 ) and Spanish. And more recently such a wiki was launched in German, see some English explanations. Astirmays (talk) 06:11, 24 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

86.196.119.208[edit]

Response by 86.196.119.208

86.196.119.208's thoughts on question 1[edit]

I think that it's important to create and multiply contents in lots of languages, even local languages and scarce languages. Wikipedia must be the place to learn and to keep the memory of languages which tend to disappear. This is a way to keep some cultures alive...

86.196.119.208's thoughts on question 2[edit]

For me a good and healthy Wikimedia project is a project where the world of education takes a growing place. What a better way to learn than creating or reviewing Wikipedia pages ! I think that we must encourage the education community to create and update contents with the help of children and students. This is the best way to associate people from an early age in Wikimedia projects...

182.93.95.121[edit]

Response by 182.93.95.121

Try making the content more visible and impactful

182.93.95.121's thoughts on question 2[edit]

To answer the second question, i had to give it a thought. The question, like your articles are a bit ambiguous to be honest and require a certain simplicity in terms of needs. Simplicity is missing. What you do have is the content. Your articles have probably saved the lives of a millions of school-going children.

Another suggestion, try prioritising your articles and filtering them. You can notice them in many online shopping websites. Adding filters can be of huge help to those who need specific details about a topic.

The last one. Make the websites less boring. Get a good graphic designer and make the pages look visually stunning. Readers often tend to get lost within the desperation provided by the labyrinth of words in articles. A visually stunning page speaks for itself in many ways.

109.232.72.15[edit]

Response by Contributions/109.232.72.15

Dear surveyors as a native Danish speaker, and farely good English reader, I enjoy using the information available to me and my pupils very much.

BUT both in English and Danish the pages and their contents are now so detailed, specific and riddled with links and terms, that only people with extensive knowledge can understand and use the vital information. one example could be "motor" witch does not offer a simple (it moves) explanation. And "engine" has a complicated picture you might use as a mechanic but not as a layperson.

SO create, through teachers and volunteers, wiki-child (patentpending?), links with easy to comprehend texts, simplified pictures and short headlines, a wiki for the young (and unambitious).

(a cucumber, a green vegetable, comes from Asia, used in salads, very watery. the north star, a star always over the north pole, if you look at it you can find north. wiki-child, a website with easy to read explanations)

Regards ruth Boehm , Denmark

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-03

119.235.53.139[edit]

Response by 119.235.53.139

make a wikipedia for childern

due to the extinction of books and large us eof internet, many students use wikipedia for all sources ofinformation,anyhow for example a topic like water for project work for small kid needs info only on rain and its daily uses,but high school student needs info on its chemical changes, evn the info could categorised based on the subjects,making it easier for browsing

even wikipedia can start a news channel,movie directory,song directory

it can also create a platform like facebook for sharing ideas and thoughts of various ppl around the world

186.83.111.209[edit]

Response by 186.83.111.209

Las ideas de 186.83.111.209 acerca de la pregunta 1[edit]

que metan trabajos para niños o que hagan una wikipedia para niños

(Machine translation, please help improve...)
"that mess works for children or to make a wikipedia for children"
¡Hola! Ya existe, se llama Vikidia. --NaBUru38 (talk) 13:13, 27 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-04

Celsius100's further thoughts on question 1[edit]

...as a further to my previous response (after dredging up some more thoughts) I think that a children's or school Wikipedia (some parents and some cultures will have issue with adult style articles and learning is progressive not all can jump to advanced concepts) could perhaps be an important idea and with that must go the ability to translate all articles consistently well (including modern idiom and in both directions) and to gather all local articles in local languages into Wikipedia as a whole, while retaining global and local historical integrity. I think that implies Wikipedia scholarships (??? or education classes or similar) for regional education and training at the very least. I was trying to get at that by pointing out that global history is the history of us all. Our local history is integral to global history and while important for inclusion it should not displace accepted fact (unless of course globally accepted facts are not that at all).

Have you seen http://schools-wikipedia.org/ for the UK curriculum? It could be improved for a wider focus. GKFX (talk) 17:05, 28 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

84.165.142.92[edit]

Response by 84.165.142.92

84.165.142.92s Gedanken zu Frage 1[edit]

Als neuer Trend in den nächsten Jahren wird meiner Meinung nach hinzukommen, dass, dadurch dass viele Kinder im Alter ab 10 Jahren ein Smartphone besitzen, eine große Menge junger Menschen auf das Internet und somit auch auf Wikipedia zugreifen wird.

(Translation)
"In my opinion in the next few years a new trend will be added, because many children at the age of 10 years possess a Smartphone, a large amount of young people will have access to the internet and thus is also to Wikipedia."

84.165.142.92s Gedanken zu Frage 2[edit]

Vielleicht eröffnen sich für Sie Möglichkeiten, Wikipedia "kinderfreundlicher" zu gestalten. Also z.B. bei manchen Seiten eine FSK-Zensierung hinzuzufügen, oder in den Kurzinfos am Kopf jedes Artikels eine Erklärung für Kinder dazuzuschreiben.

(Translation)
"Maybe new opportunities will open up to make Wikipedia more "child-friendly". For example, at some pages, add a kind of FSK censoring, or in the tooltips at the top of each article an explanation for children."

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-05

The Wikipedia Lover[edit]

Response by 50.175.69.52 23:13, 1 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia Lover's thoughts on question 1[edit]

To actually give them information they actually understand. Most people on Wikipedia are children looking for information to help them thrive and learn.

Wikipedia Lover's thoughts on question 2[edit]

They would be highly decorated. I care for this site and I want it to thrive highly. Do not leave the template of the website blank. Don't be afraid to add a little color to your site and your projects. My work here is done.

2602:304:CE3E:100:ADA4:10FD:4FE2:4D7C[edit]

Response by 2602:304:CE3E:100:ADA4:10FD:4FE2:4D7C 04:47, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

make a kids wikipidia

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-07

36.253.43.67[edit]

Response by 36.253.43.67 11:19, 1 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

36.253.43.67's thoughts on question 1[edit]

apps should be developed for each platform like android, ios, windows.creating lite versions of website is also important

There is a Wikipedia app available on Google Play and iTunes. There is also a mobile site.--GByrd (WMF) (talk) 01:47, 3 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

36.253.43.67's thoughts on question 2[edit]

the articles specially that on wikipedia need to be reviewed wisely. introduction of some special sites for the children below age 16, liki wikiKIDS/wikiYOUNG/.

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-09

Hkhurs[edit]

Response by Hkhurs 13:11, 3 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hkhurs's thoughts on question 1[edit]

The next billion users mentioned belong mostly to countries with lower education rates and very few universities. Users will mainly be using the internet for social networking sites and video streaming and music downloads.

Maybe! Perhaps I'm an optimist, but I believe that people all over the world want to learn, not just people with good education and access to universities. In fact, it's been my experience that people who don't have good access to information appreciate it very much: when conflict or natural disasters prevent children from learning, it's often the thing they value most in the world. While I hope that conflict and disaster affect fewer people in the world, I also have to hope that education remains a powerful, valued thing. Katherine (WMF) (talk) 02:10, 4 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hkhurs's thoughts on question 2[edit]

Wikimedia projects should include some online resources which will give integrated information that has been simplified to the extent of being read over and grasped by people not involved in higher education. The information in these Wikimedia resources will concentrate on the fields of study mostly related to the ones that drive the economy of third world countries, like agriculture, construction, energy etc.

That's an interesting idea. We do have Simple English Wikipedia but I think you're looking for something closer to simple Life Skills education.

There should be information regarding innovations in such fields. This way you will be bringing out the the latent potentialities of the existing systems of such countries which will prove to be a driving force for the economy. If utilized alongside latest technologies and greater information online which will be understandable by the common person having a mediocre education background. This way we will be utilizing the existent resources efficiently for the betterment of the whole World. As every part of the World will give it's own output that will get integrated with the rest of the World. It's about utilizing the existent potentialities and resources faster and with efficiency and also creating an educated environment among such populations. Such ventures will lead to better economies and environments that will act as springboards for the eventual progress of the country in science and technology.

This sort of information is really important. Many wonderful organizations do excellent work in this area, including agencies of the United Nations, the World Bank, and many, many international non-profit organizations. This sounds like it would be interesting for Wikimedians to explore collaborations with these sorts of organizations, perhaps similar to GLAM collaborations? Katherine (WMF) (talk) 02:41, 4 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:2015 Strategy/Community consultation/2015-03-11

DheepakG[edit]

Response by DheepakG 04:59, 3 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

DheepakG's thoughts on question 1[edit]

The next-billion-user will be connecting through handheld devices. Especaially, low-end Android/similar non-apple phone. Also, the majority will be either students or parents of grown-ups to connect with their child, age group falling under 8-21 and 35+. Need for Wiki* sites in Vernacular language is highly needed. For enabling them we need to create awareness especially through TV commercials(still a mass medium), tie-up with some non-profits and providing access to wiki* sites.

DheepakG's thoughts on question 2[edit]

Imparting all the Academic topics to Wikipedia will be too good. Or WikiCademy (akin wikiversity) but should cover more rudimentary concepts. Imagine a 11 year old getting help from wiki to solve his homework. He will recommend it to his peers. Wiki gets popular. Schools should give free access to Wiki sites.

Many thanks for these thoughts. We will be discussing them. GeoffBrigham (WMF) (talk) 01:50, 6 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

CA2payitforward[edit]

Response by CA2payitforward 17:52, 3 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

CA2payitforward's thoughts on question 1[edit]

First: A layered wikipedia structure. What I mean is that detailed and complete explanations and documentation are great, but may clog up the message. For some topics it is hard for a non-expert to get an idea of what is described. Therefor I'd suggest a layered wikipedia page with a "layman's" version, say in the top part of the page and an "expert's" version with all the gori details etc. below.

SUGGESTION: wikipage with laymens version in the top and expert version in the bottom.

Second: Authored sections. I have tried to make friends/colleagues write on wikipedia, but encountered the argument from an expert in the field that he/she didnt feel like writing up a section if it could be messed up by anybody with a web browser. Likewise in some cases having no author means that the expertise (basis for the statements made) of the author is unknown. Expert authors may be invited or be inserted only after certification i.e. when their identity has been verified. The section should then be accredited to the named author alongside their credential. Having authored a section I'm sure would also make people take more ownership and care for their section and as a consequence also the wikipage where it appears.

SUGGESTION: Authored sections within a wikipage, where only author can edit. Reader may suggest changes/removal to author/wikipedia team.

CA2payitforward's thoughts on question 2[edit]

There are many projects, which in my mind, would blossom if they could use the WikiMedia infrastructure/platform. Education of kids would in my mind be an important area:
1) Kids encyclopaedia
2) Sharing platform for teaching material, structured as teacher packs.
- Meta-info: Age group, duration, teacher preparation, student workload.
- Material: student handouts, 'laboratory material' for hands one activities discussions.
- Review: Teacher and student feedback and score.
3)Sharing and discussion platform for teaching methods and approaches.
Teachers are in my mind reinventing the wheel and spending most of their precious time redoing the basics. While if they had, say 1000 teacher's packs, then they could select the one they need and add their twist or improvement. WikiMedia is about sharing and learning, so supporting a project of this kind could have an impact on millions of kids (hoping to reach a billion i.e. virtually all ;-)

Thanks @CA2payitforward: as you are talking about expanding the forms of contributions, what do you think about allowing users to create instructional content that relates to articles? LilaTretikov (WMF) (talk) 01:31, 4 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @LilaTretikov (WMF):
To me it sounds like a great idea to add an "instructional content" feature to a wikipage. A big problem though is how to make it easy to add stuff there from a "technical" point of view. I have been programming for more than twenty years, but had to fight with this editor to get a couple of paragraphs come out reasonably. Teaching material also needs to be appealing, could using the Open Data Format be an option?

What do you think about the kids wikipedia?

Best greetings CA2

2602:30A:2C37:84F0:18DE:CE8:3C8A:80B7[edit]

Response by 2602:30A:2C37:84F0:18DE:CE8:3C8A:80B7 01:12, 6 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

you guys need more informtion because i need info on orange chicken and you need more color because to be honset you guys have no color at all and make have a teenager make a wiki user id and have them make this site very interesting make one for adults schools and kids

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