Re: [LM_NET] seeking opinions: are educators hostile to wikipedia?

[Brent Bradley <bsb_lib@YAHOO.COM>]

It seems to me that wikipedia is not only a potentially great resource (if its 
contents are verifiable with another more trustworthy source) of fact, but also a 
great resource of education regarding teaching someone to "tell the difference". We 
say this is a tough thing to do, but I think we have great examples right in front 
of us. I very much like that wikipedia keeps old versions of the pages, so students 
could examine what has changed and debate why something was removed / added, and 
whether the information is true now, was then, whatever...

msirwin <msirwin@OPTONLINE.NET> wrote:I had a very interesting conversation tonight 
with my son, an academic 
librarian, who asked what I thought of Wikipedia. I haven't spent enough 
time with it to have formed a full opinion, but given its premise, I have 
warned students about using it as their main source of information (is it 
any easier to use or more accesible than the online encyclopedias we pay 
for??) Ken suggested that its value may lie in the content that simply isn't 
in a standard encyclopedia--some little rock band from outback Oklahoma, for 
instance. That hadn't occurred to me. Now that type of thing is not likely 
to generate scholarly research anyway, but it may be a source which provides 
students with information (i.e., good enough info) about topics of personal 
interest. It, too, surely has its niche. Just so long as the recognize the 
difference.

Maureen S. Irwin
Library Director
Rye Country Day School
Rye, NY 10580
msirwin@optonline.net 

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***
"History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social 
transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence 
of the good people."
--Martin Luther King
***
Brent Bradley, LMS at Valley View Community & Henry Wilson Memorial in Farmington, 
NH
bsb underscore lib at yahoo dot com

                
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