Pedagogical Uses of Wikibooks: Fostering Collaborative Writing of a Wikibook in a MediaStudies Course

Richard Beach

University of Minnesota

Uses for Blogs and Wikis Blogs:

Individual expression of ideas/personal accounts

Hyperlinking of texts Comments from

peers Multimodal writing

Wikis: Collaborative writing

of reports/essays Shared revision Hyperlinking of texts Multimodal writing

Wikis: Information-sharing Interactive clearing-house for sharing

information Schools Organizations Businesses

Sharing information leads to collective action Conference on English Education 2007 Summit

Wikibooks Wikibooks: open-source textbooks Rhetoric and Composition Wikibook Theory of Basic Writing course Wookieepedia: Star Wars fans

Wikibooks: constructivist learning Invite an activist versus passive stance

“I can add to or improve this text” “I can participate in constructing knowledge

about media” Foster collaborative sharing of ideas

Requires negotiation of competing perspectives in constructing knowledge

Wikibooks: collaborative academic writing Writing for audiences outside the class

Higher level of motivation Future course sections add new material

Value of collective student work Co-teaching: Peers learning from peers Shared expertise within a group

Multimodal writing Combine texts with images/video/sound

Media literacy methods course Digital media Film analysis Critical approaches Representations Ethnography Genres News/documentary Textbook/website: Teachingmedialiteracy.com

Class media literacy wikibook Media literacy wikibook

Course syllabus/resources Teaching activities Final unit chapters

PBwiki features WYSIWYG editing Sidebar: organize links Plug-ins: YouTube/YackPack

Student comment: Wikis The wikis were a neat database to provide information to us as students and they also worked to form a good community of learners. I felt highly accountable for the final wiki project because it was not just MY wiki, but everyone’s wiki. I like being able to go to one place and get a wealth of information.

Wikibook assignments Student ownership of issues/topics

Students mutually select issues/topics that interest or engage them

Scaffolding social collaboration Value of “blog partners” Use blogs as “prewriting” for content

Issue of quality control oversight/evaluation of content

Jenkins: Information literacies involved in use of Wikipedia Collective Intelligence -- the ability to pool knowledge and

compare notes with others towards a common goal. Judgment -- the ability to evaluate the reliability and credibility of

different information source. Networking -- the ability to search for, synthesize and

disseminate information. Negotiation -- the ability to travel across diverse communities,

discerning and respecting multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative sets of norms.

Informed skepticism: Teach information literacies Transparent: how knowledge is constructed

and disputed “History”: track changes over time “Comments”: note comments related to

changes/corrections

Value: Reflection on issues of Wikipedia/wikibooks Genre Rhetorical sense of audience Equity in collaboration Editorial oversight/control “Objectivity” Verifiability Plagiarism in digital/remix world

Genre: What Wikipedia is not: A paper encyclopedia, dictionary, publisher of

original thought, soapbox, blog, directory, manual, guidebook, textbook, indiscriminate collection of information, censored, battleground, anarchy, democracy, bureaucracy, web host

Class wikibook as textbook Definitive source of authority versus “work in

progress”

Work in progress "Wikipedia's radical openness means

that any given article may be, at any given moment, in a bad state: for example, it could be in the middle of a large edit or it could have been recently vandalized.”

Audience Blogging or podcasting

Familiar, small audience Wikibook: Writing for peers Larger unknown audiences

If describing activities for teachers, then how much context to provide?

Collaborative writing: Contributors not sharing the load or knowing

what to do Need to determine who is responsible for

what tasks/topics Tensions between authors in framing ideas

Need to respect and negotiate differences in perspectives

Collaborative writing: Wikipedia Editorial oversight

Who determines the validity of information? How are revisions/hacking monitored?

What constitutes “objectivity”? What are the criteria for “objectivity”? How are alternative perspectives included?

Verifiability “Verifiability says that attribution is required

for direct quotes and for material that is challenged or likely to be challenged. Any material that is challenged and for which no source is provided may be removed by any editor.”

Zhan: Achieving consensus“I believe some researchers studying Wikipedia are keen to

highlight the project as a model for the power of consensus-building. In my experience, consensus was largely fragile, temporary and unstable - and chiefly a manifestation of semi-managed, semi-policed, never-fully-resolved conflict more than anything. Admittedly, to engage in that conflict was often enjoyable, and was a primary attraction for participating in Wikipedia. However, in the end for me, there was too much trivial and unreasonable antagonism and no end in sight for resolving myriad issues.”

Editors’ constant monitoring Jonathan Dee "All the News That’s Fit to Print Out” The New York

Times Magazine: Why do young people serve as editors ready to quickly review and remove misinformation?

A culture of subjectivity: “But the Wikipedians, most of them born in the information age, have tasked themselves with weeding that subjectivity not just out of one another’s discourse but also out of their own. They may not be able to do any actual reporting from their bedrooms or dorm rooms or hotel rooms, but they can police bias, and they do it with a passion that’s no less impressive for its occasional excess of piety. Who taught them this? It’s a mystery; but they are teaching it to one another."

Alternatives to Wikipedia Citizendium

No anonymous editing new "editor" role for specialists in particular subjects.

Scholarpedia Articles written by experts who act as curators Anonymous peer review Curators must approve revisions

Policy: Editorial control Conservapedia “Evolution”

“Creationist scientists believe that mutations, natural selection, and genetic drift would not cause macroevolution.[14][15][16][17][18]. Furthermore, creationist scientists assert that the life sciences as a whole support the creation model and do not support the evolutionary model.”

Editorial control of content Who and how sets policy for inclusion

Need for historical analysis: Issue: plagiarism Joseph Reagle: When the Britannica was in

its infancy, much like the Wikipedia today, its founding editor admitted he "made a Dictionary of Arts and Sciences with a pair of scissors, clipping out from various books a quantum sufficit of matter for the printer."

Yeo, R. (2000). Encyclopaedic Visions: Scientific Dictionaries and Enlightenment Culture.

Wiki: Online resources on digital writing: Beach, Anson, Breuch, & Swiss,

Engaging Students in Digital Writing (Christopher Gordon, Fall, 2007)

Wiki resource site (http://digitalwriting.pbwiki.com)