Wikipedia

When writing research papers with my sixth-grade students, I did not allow them to use Wikipedia as the source of their information. We talked about the fact that because anyone can edit the site, it is not always completely accurate. One student asked, "So is it EVER ok to search for an answer to a question and find it on Wikipedia?" The question was convicting as I reflected on the number of times I have searched for a quick answer, statistic, or fact and found what I was looking for on Wikipedia. How would I answer that question without being a complete hypocrite? What followed was an interesting discussion on the availability of information on the internet. What can you trust as reliable? We practiced searching for the same information using many different sources to see if the information given was consistent. I realized afterwards that a simple conversation about Wikipedia (and my fear that my students would blindly believe potentially inaccurate information) led them to dive even deeper into research.

David Wolman, in his article in Wired Magazine, "The Critics Need a Reboot. The Internet Hasn't Led Us Into a New Dark Age" states, "The explosion of knowledge represented by the Internet and abetted by all sorts of digital technologies makes us more productive and gives us the opportunity to become smarter, not dumber. Think of Wikipedia and its emergent spinoffs, like Wiktionary. Imperfect as they may be, the collective brainpower contained within these kinds of sites — and the hunger for learning and accurate information they represent — is something human history has never known before. (Even Encyclopedia Britannica will soon be accepting user contributions.)"

If students are simply "set free" to use the internet in any capacity, we as educators have no right to complain about the outcomes. Wolman goes on to say, "We need better schools as well as a renewed commitment to reason and scientific rigor so that people can distinguish knowledge from garbage. The Web is not an obstacle in this project. It's an unparalleled tool for generating, finding, and sharing sound information. What's moronic is to assume that it hurts us more than it helps."

I have a renewed commitment and enthusiasm to further my knowledge about and use of the internet WITH my students so that I can use it is a tool as opposed to an opponent.