Talk:Education/Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom

Reading

"Reading"? :o Nemo 13:41, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

Wikidata training

@SAbdallah-WMF: I am an administrator on Wikidata. We have an ongoing problem with new users who create items with no regard for our notability criteria. Unfortunately, such items usually end up getting deleted, which is a waster of both our time and theirs. We try our best to educate locally, but we're always looking for new ways to reach out and help people contribute successfully. I've been looking at the "Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom" program, and I have a number of questions:

• Does it cover ensuring that new items or articles comply with a project's notability criteria?
• Does it cover the importance of responding appropriately to feedback?
• Is Wikidata specifically included in this training?
• Where can I find a list of usernames for certified trainers?
• Is there a review process whereby certification can be withdrawn?

Thanks, Bovlb (talk) 17:55, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Bovlb, I can't answer other questions but usernames of several trainers are on Education/Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom/Meet our Certified Trainers. ─ The Aafī ^(talk) 17:58, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@TheAafi Thanks for that. I did see that page, but a significant fraction of the list do not have usernames, and the list does not seem to have been substantially updated since 2022. Also, I have encountered at least one user who claims to be a certified trainer, but whose username does not appear on that list. Bovlb (talk) 18:04, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I see. I also believe it is not a good thing to publicly disclose real names. User names should have been used instead. ─ The Aafī ^(talk) 18:08, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Bovlb, just a note that the person who created the page and whom you pinged above does not anymore work with Wikimedia Foundation and the userpage is marked as "former". It appears that all the relevant pages are out of maintenance? ─ The Aafī on Mobile (^talk) 18:37, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Bovlb, Thanks a lot for the concern. I'm one of the certified trainers of the Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom (RWiC) program from the very first cohort and you'll find the complete list of certified trainers in this page. The page doesn't seem to be updated because the RWiC Training of the Trainers course, that introduces new certified trainers, has been stopped after its third iteration in 2022. The wmf person pinged here doesn't work for the foundation anymore.

The program doesn't involve any direct and mandatory onwiki editing activity as a part the formal teachers' training. It rather focuses on training the high school teachers on how Wikipedia can be best used in their classroom to increase their students' media and information literacy skills. The three modules of the program focuses on the process of finding, evaluating and creating knowledge in Wikipedia. You can call these three modules as the textbooks of this training program, everything we teach in the program, is there in these modules. We usually use wikilearn to deliver the training, we sometimes use social media platforms if the teachers feel more comfortable there. We run this training in partnership with different United Nations organizations, Education ministries of different countries, teachers' associations and other major stakeholders of the education system.

The certified trainers are involved in other education activities outside this particular program, that is perhaps the reason you found some of them in this list also. There are numerous education activities all around the world and I don't think there's a complete list of them anywhere. But since we all are connected to each other in some way or another, I can try to help you reach out to the people you want to get connected to.

Now, answering to your questions specifically.

• Does it cover ensuring that new items or articles comply with a project's notability criteria?

- The program doesn't involve any mandatory onwiki content creation activity. But it does educate the trainees (the high school teachers) about the core content policies of Wikipedia. Read module:2, page 12 - 33.

• Does it cover the importance of responding appropriately to feedback?

- Reiterating the previous statement, The program doesn't involve any mandatory onwiki content creation activity. But it does educate the trainees about how wiki(p)medians organize their contributions. Read module:3, page 10 - 27.

• Is Wikidata specifically included in this training?

- No

• Where can I find a list of usernames for certified trainers?

- This is the complete list of trainers. Some trainers preferred to link their usernames and you can find them there

• Is there a review process whereby certification can be withdrawn?

- No, not yet. The Wikimedia Foundation Education Team used to maintain and provide professional support to this program. The team has been dissolved and noone is there to maintain the program for now. The trainers are organizing themselves independently and hopefully we'll figure out something soon

BIDROHI ^Hello.. 19:52, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll just ping @BVershbow (WMF) then, as they seem to be still active. Bovlb (talk) 20:41, 8 January 2024 (UTC)