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Talk:Freelance academics

This page and this description "...is an effort to create a guide to people attempting to do professional level research outside of traditional academia." seem to be out of sync. I don't see much about research methodology. I thought I would see things like hypothesis writing, data collection, data manipulation, data analysis, findings (presentation: writing, visualization, graphics, tables)...

 * The target audience for this document presumably already knows how do to all of that stuff, and there are already a lot of published guides for that if they need help. The audience for this document is your "frustrated Ph.D." who is working at a software company, and wants to get back into active scientific research.  There are no "howto" guides that I'm aware of for this. Roadrunner 04:01, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

 * The other point is that research methodology should be the same on the inside and outside of traditional academia. A guide to how to do research is a useful wikibook, but IMHO, it's another wikibook Roadrunner 04:03, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

 * I buy that. You're right. --K1v1n 12:18, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

This 'how to' guide will need to draw attention to the intricate 'politics' of academia and academic publishing. While many assume that there is something called 'science' as an ideal set of values independent from academia, de facto most of what is considered 'scientific' gets filtered by academia through applications of criteria that are not in fact very scientific. Although I understand that wikipedians will aim at neutrality, a 'how to' guide of freelance academia without the 'politics' would be rather useless and help nobody. Being a freelance academic entails a specific positioning in the political struggle for the legitimation and delegitimation of particular knowledge.

 * Yup. Academia has politics just like any other large organization has politics.  Part of what is missing once you end up outside of the university is practical advice in out to navigate through academic politics.  It took me about five years after I got my Ph.D. to realize that the idea of the lone academic wasn't how things really worked, and other three years to figure out that you really, really have to attend conferences to get things done.  There is a whole mess of Byzantine politics that you have to go through in order to get things like an NSF or NIH grant, and if you aren't in an academic institution, you generally don't have the knowledge or social contacts necessary to get access to these sources of funding.  This leads to a closed circle of wealth and power, which isn't making anyone really happy.
 * Grant review boards (which I've been on) aim for something approaching "objectivity" and "excellence" but people don't think too much about the subjective parts of process. For example, to apply for a grant, you first must know that the grant exists, which implies being part of an information network.  There are a whole other bunch of "secret handshakes" that you have go to through to get the money, but there is nothing that I can see that prevents these secret handshakes from being more widely known.
 * Roadrunner 13:52, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Roadrunner 13:52, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

What about doing research (discussion) within Wikiversity? Starting to write and discuss on a topic that can lead to a paper publication. However, we have to thinkc about copyright. Schoeberl 16:02, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Anyone interested in the future of research at Wikiversity and publishing of research results should join the policy discussions at Wikiversity Beta (also) --JWSchmidt 16:09, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

title: Talk:Freelance academics


text:
Portal:Physical Sciences

ja:Portal:理学

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Portal:Physical Sciences


text:
Wikiversity:Learning

This page is for exploring how learning takes place on Wikiversity. The model we are talking about is based on "learning by doing", or "experiential learning". So far, this seems to be the most appropriate model for a wiki-based environment, which is all about participation.

Introduction
Materials will be hosted on Wikiversity as stand-alone content—to be used as part of a non-Wikiversity course, or for self-study—but they could also act as an initiative for further work, on Wikiversity or other Wikimedia projects, or elsewhere in general. Furthermore, the use of these materials within the community will inevitably also constitute a type of collaborative learning. However, the material that Wikiversity hosts may be used in any way, depending on the people who use them and the context in which they are used.

Experiential learning

 * Everyone participates
 * It might be nice to have a page access/edit access ratio calculated and presented to give us an idea of what the reading participation is compared to the edit/crumb dropping participation.

 * Everyone "brings themselves" to the learning environment—i.e. your previous experiences
 * Everyone assists with improving the instructional scaffolding while using it.
 * Reflective cycle (keeping a journal)
 * other forms? Playing a simulation, deriving an equation, painting a landscape, making money on a stock exchange, presenting a business plan, filing organizational registration for a non profit, ...

 * See John DeweyDemocracy_and_Education, Lev Vygotsky, Jean Piaget, Kurt Lewin ...

Learning by doing
The process of actually learning on Wikiversity is primarily through experience—"learning by doing", "experiential learning", or "proactive learning". Editing a wiki is an active, participatory process, involving action (editing, being bold) and reflection (discussion). Learning activities on Wikiversity need to focus on their wiki-based potential and the fact that they are based on collaborative, communal processes—see Learning community, or some ideas for different learning groups below.

Learning together
Fundamentally though, learning is seen as inherent in the act of participating in Wikiversity—in this, the following quote from Lave and Wenger (1991) may be useful:

 * "There is a significant contrast between a theory of learning in which practice (in a narrow, replicative sense) is subsumed within processes of learning and one in which learning is taken to be an integral aspect of practice (in a historical, generative sense)." (pp:34-35)

In other words, it is through taking part in developing and critiquing materials that people will form learning groups/communities and both further their own and the group's learning and generate new knowledge in the process. Wikiversity is about facilitating learning, and, as well as hosting excellent materials which may be used off the shelf by casual users, it is also designed to allow for this type of collaborative learning to take place.

Learn as you teach (and vice versa)
Throughout reading and building learning materials, you might observe and gather new ideas worth documenting, as well as help yourself improve in that topic through memorizing repetition and by using your own creation and pages you contributed to as a handy resource, readily accessible from anywhere.

Critical thinking

 * The ability to critically assess information, beliefs etc—including your own beliefs
 * Media 113b:Wikiversity:Media113

 * A key skill in all areas of life Thinking_And_Moral_Problems
 * Common to educational programs on citizenship, media literacy ...

Learning groups
(This content was moved here from the Wikiversity project proposal)
 * A learning group on a subject might write lectures collectively using readings they have done (chosen collectively). These would be a way for the group to get down the major points that they have learned.  It might look like lecture notes that students take in regular university classes.  These notes act as a guide for users to then take the knowledge they have gained and apply it to improving Wikipedia articles and writing Wikibooks.  On the other hand, the group might choose to meet in chat rooms. These learning groups might not use wiki format lectures.
 * They might, collectively, create assignments to get a better understanding of the material and to contribute to the Wikimedia community. One example would be to have the group set out to improve a Wikipedia entry based on information learned from the readings and discussions. Another, most likely as a final project once the group has completed it's learning objectives, is to write a Wikibook based on what is learned from the group. This wikibook could then be used in future groups who decide to study the same subject, and they might perhaps again improve upon the wikibook based on what they have learned (possibly using sources the first group did not).
 * For example, users could form reading groups. Imagine an assignment where users read book X for author Y. User A learns information that is useful for Wikipedia, and adds a citation to book X in some Wikipedia articles. User B quotes a sentence of book X in Wiktionary to demonstrate how to use a word. User C mentions book X or author Y in a Wikibook. User D learned much from reading book X, but never contributed to Wikipedia, Wiktionary, or Wikibooks using that knowledge. All four users benefited by using talk pages at Wikiversity to discuss confusing or interesting parts of book X.
 * Another example would be the query expedition. It might be organized as a pool of best guesses with individuals or teams taking pro, con, strawman, idiot user, or other roles in the attack/defense/hybridization of the final answer to 1.) deliver to the query originator and 2.) evaluate per compare contrast procedures against initial WAGs for credit, glory and learning feedback.  This product would obviously be posted somewhere safe from deletionists until other teams had a chance to evaluate how best to integrate the newly found and created knowledge artifacts, data and links into other Wikiversity resources such as the brainstorming stash or inevitable to do and wishlists.

See: Catalogue of Learning Projects, About Learning Projects | Мне на кризис наплевать, вылез в топе гоу бухать.

Citing sources
Some Wikimedia projects, especially Wikipedia, need to cite sources. Learning groups at Wikiversity can study such sources and teach users to cite them.

For example, the Wikipedia article Effects of the automobile on societies cites no outside sources. But if it did, the article would not cite every outside source about said effects of automobiles. Wikiversity could make a list of references to outside sources (including ISBN numbers, URLs, and links to Wikisource and Wikiquote) for studying effects of automobiles on societies. Wikiversity users could study some of these sources and provide comments. They can also use the sources to edit the Wikipedia article, thus adding those sources as citations. See: Service community and Citing Sources

Assessment
One of the questions we will have to ask ourselves in providing for educational activities is: "how are we going to manage assessment?"

Consider the following quote:

 * "in order for students to become effective lifelong learners, they need also to be prepared to undertake assessment of the learning tasks they face throughout their lives" (Boud, 2000, p. 152)

We are developing a model of peer learning on Wikiversity - one in which people educate themselves and each other (through experience). A sustainable model of peer-learning involves giving people control over their learning - so that they, themselves, will be equipped with the skills they need in life, and also be able to apply those skills to help others in their learning. See also Keppell et al. (2006).

Other models of learning

 * "Acquisition and repetition of facts" (?)
 * Exposure to subtle models. Repeated exposure, daily (via many different individual models, people, personalities).
 * Sui generis. Creation from first principles.  Rediscovering the work of others through personal insight.
 * Original Work—Learning by doing creatively.
 * Dialectic:  Formal debate, analysis, or discussion with others.
 * Essentialism
 * Progressiveism
 * Perennialism
 * Existentialism
 * Behaviourism

Other Learning Communities or Possibly Useful Research Results Online

 * http://edu.tikiwiki.org
 * TikiWiki is a CMS/Groupware/whatever and is used in several educative contexts. This website is dedicated to help that use and gather useful components to make it easier. --83.35.198.10 19:21, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

 * http://h2oproject.law.harvard.edu/rotisserie.html
 * This software tool attempts to facilitate organized online classes by broadcasting messages and responses in rounds to all participants. Might be a way to tame wild wikis for courses which need or want more traditional accountable participation from registered members only. Downside, must initially complete "Who are the leaders here games and discussions" so management or facilitation authority is established and correctly setup in the software project for the group.  Introducing leader point of failure for the group.  user:lazyquasar

 * http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_2/keats/
 * This article analyzes open content production and potential advantages to the university system of Africa. It identifies as essential transparent comprehensive information access and communications between all team members as essential.  Cabals or secretive bilateral gossip or exchange of information is identified as destructive to the overall productivity and survival of the production team.  70.110.54.16 06:01, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

 * Wikireason This online learning community, presently hibernating, seeks formal debate, analysis, or discussion with others.  Could be incredibly useful site for specific groups of Wikiversity participants for appropriate activities which could later be referenced or incorporated into Wikiversity materials or processes.  "Wikiversity is not a debate club or chit chat student union .... wikireason exists for that! 8) 70.110.35.3 03:08, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

 * Chains of Reason is a site which seeks to provide "a unique way for anyone to follow, present, and contribute to, arguments for and against particular beliefs - moral", "political", "scientific", "religious", "or whatever." As with Wikireason, could perhaps serve Wikiversity Participants as a site on which to engage in debate, such debate to be referenced or incorporated into Wikiversity materials and processes.  --  Dionysios  (talk), Founder of the Wikiversity School of Rhetoric and Public Speaking (RPS), Date: 2007-10-02 (October 2, 2007) Time:  1824 UTC

 * Debatepedia, the "free wiki encyclopedia of debates, arguments, evidence, and debate-related subjects" of the International Debate Education Association (IDEA) seeks to be "the home and future of sound debate and deliberation online". Users can edit and document arguments and evidence on any topic.  Debatepedia is designed as a participatory resource for debaters, students, citizens, politicians.  For debaters and debate teams, it is a way to gather evidence for competitions as well as a place to deposit evidence for the benefit of other debaters and the wider citizenry.  As with Wikireason, Debatepedia could perhaps serve Wikiversity Participants as a site on which to engage in debate, such debate to be referenced or incorporated into Wikiversity materials and processes.  --  Dionysios  (talk), Founder of the Wikiversity School of Rhetoric and Public Speaking (RPS), Date: 2007-10-02 (October 2, 2007) Time:  1824 UTC

 * http://www.learningwiki.com/ Apparently a group of learning communities with an emphasis on elearning communities.

 * http://econwiki.lse.ac.uk/wiki/Main_Page An economics course placed online within its own Wikimedia Wiki.
 * It identifies areas students in the course are invited to participate in documenting. It references Wikibooks as a resource: http://econwiki.lse.ac.uk/wiki/The_textbook
 * Its license is a creative commons sharealike (link on front page http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/) that would seem to preclude direct cut and paste interaction between its material and Wikibooks or Wikiversity. Obviously paraphrasing or cross checking facts remains legal.

 * http://cs.marlboro.edu/wikiacademia is an open source course wiki that looks a lot like Wikipedia. There's a poster on it at Wikimania2006. —Jim Mahoney 22:45, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

 * http://communitiesofinquiry.com/ A breakdown of issues, pedagogies and methodologies relevant to creating, developing and researching online learning communities - based on Rourke et al. (2001)

 * http://teachingwiki.org and http://writingwiki.org - (seemingly) interlinked wikis devoted to teaching writing and sharing teacher resources

 * http://wikieducator.org/Main_Page

We are not sure...
What all the possible learning modes, methods, preferences, factors, etc. are using wikis with other online and physical world resources are or may be. It would be extremely helpful to our Research Network and the School of Education if you share your thoughts, observations, wild ass guess (WAG), opinions or hearsay regarding how wikis and other resources can be used to aid and inspire useful, civilly responsible learning either directly or indirectly.

 * This is an interesting link with a table that discusses how overlapping groups influence each other and propagate information over networks.  Has some interesting implications for how Wikipedia, Wikiversity and other large global focal points might need to organize for effectiveness.  user:lazyquasar

title: Wikiversity:Learning


text:
Wikiversity talk:Learning

Learning by editing Wikiversity pages
The wiki user interface facilitates collaborative editing of webpages. Wikiversity needs to strive to find ways to maximize opportunities for turning collaborative editing of Wikiversity webpages into useful learning experiences. WikiMedia projects have several fundamental types of webpages (see "namespace"). For example:
 * 1) the core project documents - these exist in the "main namespace"
 * 2) pages for user disussion of project documents - the "talk" namespace
 * 3) each user can make personal pages - these exist in the "user" namespace

Keeping a journal. It will be useful for Wikiversity participants to make known to the community what their learning objectives are, what their background is, and what frustrations they are experiencing as they try to attain their learning objectives. Each participant will be able to keep a personal journal that could include a fairly detailed account of their educational background, learning goals and frustrations experienced in trying to attain those goals. A natural place for user journals would be within the user namespace. However, Wikiversity should have ways of encouraging participants to take note of what is written in user journals and making use of that information to help guide users towards resources and activities that will facilitate learning objectives. How should Wikiversity be structured so as to maximize the utility of participant journals?

 * It seems to me that unless a way is provided to deliver only pertinent material to potential readers that journals will overwhelm participants with too much irrelevant information. Perhaps a common class/section "journal" could be established where participants could make class/maze/portal pertinent entries.  Essentially a question or feedback page linked to from the main class/syllubus/project/task page. user:lazyquasar

The main namespace. What should be the content of webpages in the Wikiversity main namespace? One possibility would be that Wikiversity would adopt project goals that are similar to Wikibooks. The webpages of the main namespace at Wikibooks are usually textbook modules. If we started a textbook called "Wikiversity for Dummies" then this page could be a textbook module for that Wikibook. Similarly, Wikiversity could have main namespace webpages that are "learning materials" such as lesson plans. The participants of Wikiversity would then be expected to collaboratively author lesson plans. For example, there could be a Wikiversity lesson plan for how to teach a course using a particular Wikibook. Such lesson plans would be like "skins" for textbooks. There could be one Wikiversity lesson plan for how to use Consciousness studies in a university course called "Consciousness studies" being taught in a bricks-and-mortar philosophy department. There could be another Wikiversity lesson plan that might make use of Consciousness studies as a secondary textbook for use in a conventional university neuroscience course. A third Wikiversity lesson plan could be centered on use of the Consciousness studies Wikibook for a "reading group" that would bring together a group of Wikiversity participants to study that particular textbook.

 * I think we should begin thinking in terms of "Portal" pages or entry points. These could be linked to from a variety of indexes or catalogs both maintained by departments, counselers, instructors, and random participants.  The portals could be tailored from a wide variety of templates that have been proven useful or interesting.  For example.  One portal might lead one through the basics of what is known about Mars, allow interactive self quizzes and restore a previous state of a Mars Simulation (available open from Mars Society) for the student.  Another portal might be designed for dry stodgy research planetolists who just wnat to get up to speed on the latest Mars developments before attending a professional conference on spacesuit design.  One thing is certain.  Many volunteers will have specific goals and groups for which they wish to design portals or courses or curriculums.  The Wikipedia's previous practice of confuse them with arbitrary definitions and policies and then allow a "regular" to pick a preferred alternative is unlikely to work in a large endeaver such as a successful wikiversity will become.  user:lazyquasar

Learning groups. How would a collaboration such as a Wikiversity-based "reading group" function within Wikiversity? If a "lesson plan" for the reading group existed within the Wikiversity main namespace, then one possibility would be that the learning activity of those participating in that reading group might largely involve editing the talk page corresponding to the lesson plan. However, it is not clear that a single talk page would adequately serve the needs of a reading group. Also, the talk page for a lesson plan should really be about how to improve the lesson plan. Should a Wikiversity learning group simply interact through some sort of chat page? An alternative would be that the lesson plan for a reading group would specify certain collaborative projects that would be the focus of "learning by doing". A project called, "chat about what you read" would not be a very scholarly learning project. Useful projects for such a reading group might include:
 * 1) find and fix errors in the Consciousness studies Wikibook.
 * 2) find and discuss additional sources and references that support or contradict or expand on what is in the Consciousness studies Wikibook.
 * 3) there could be a "rough spots" project in which members of the reading group identify and discuss parts of the Consciousness studies Wikibook that cause confusion.

The "learn by doing" activities of the reading group would then center on project pages that would be scholarly efforts relevant to the Consciousness studies Wikibook. This suggests the possibility that the webpages of the Wikiversity main namespace should be "learning project" pages. The main activity of Wikiversity participants would be the creation and editing of Wikiversity learning projects. Wikiversity would facilitate learning by helping participants to find existing projects and form new ones that match the learning goals of Wikiversity participants.  --JWSurf 17:48, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

We may need some kind of "flow control" over and above account login. For example, I have a bit of a wikification hit and run style that simply infuriates some people who would like to constrain everyone to a focused approach on a predefined subject. This might actually work with me after we attract a large enough population to have some space technology specific applied courses or projects. However, there will always be new emerging fields and innovators in search of birds of a feather or possibly useful other birds willing to flock together briefly. So ... how do we control the traffic a section or team or group receives by some standard programmable criteria such that we keep trolling, allegations of trolling, and other adverse interactions to a managable roar rather than all out chaos? Obviously I am talking about interference created by inappropriate mixing of participants not simply personality conflicts.
 * Types of Flow

 * Asynchronous seminar ... anybody anytime. We have this now for free. The wiki way! 8)
 * Specific traditional section. We gather x participants who have agreed to a schedule and format and proceed.  No one external to this group allowed into team space or materials unless invited until it is complete ... obviously this will need some kind of clean up phase after team is done even if just flipping an attribute bit so team assets become fully public access.
 * The above may be a specific case of the virtual organizations that the computer grid researchers talk about. Perhaps our Grid Engineering and Management group can find some applicable technologies in the near future.
 * Obviously at the moment each entry portal creates or tailors their own flow control and by documenting appropriately can allow responsible participants to weave their way around "closed" or inappropriate places.
 * Perequisite driven. What to do if neophytes will not seek recommended fundamentals before insisting on interacting with advanced participant processes inappropriately?  Neither flaming, labeling and lynching, or ignoring seem to work well.  What to do when Linus Pauling wanders into our "underwater basketweaving via teleoperated submarines on Europa" and insists that he has useful insight on scuba diving offworld?  Educate him? Direct him to a newly established Lunar Scuba Diving portal and hope he stays there or wanders elsewhere?  Whine loudly on the Wikiversity-L mailing list that Linus is at it again and must be lynched?  user:lazyquasar

There are many possible patterns of participant interaction that could take place in the Wikiverity community. Many of these are suggested by patterns of interaction that happen in conventional schools. However, conventional patterns of interaction, such as a fixed group of participants meeting together for a specified period of time, do not respect the mechanics of the wiki user interface. Wikiversity should center on the editing of project documents by "anybody anytime". Yes, there needs to be "flow control". If the main type of Wikiversity document is a "learning project", each main namespace page would naturally have an introduction section that describes what type of "learning project" exists at that page. Many learning projects would have "prerequisites". A description of the prerequisites could guide Wikiversity participants to sources of information that are useful for participation in that particular "learning project". The five world experts on "basket weaving via teleoperated submarines" might feel that they would make faster progress on a particular "teleoperated submarine-related learning project" if they could exclude from participation all basket weaving neophytes. However, the experts should not simply put up a sign saying "keep out unless you have a sound understanding of basket weaving". As participants in Wikiversity, part of their task should be to help the neophyte basket weavers. At the very least, the prerequisites section of an advanced "basket weaving via teleoperated submarines" learning project should have links to the introductory learning project Basket Weaving 101. If neophytes try to participate in an advanced "learning project", it is likely that their contributions will be removed. The experts will have to gently direct the neophytes to some other learning project that is more appropriate. A system of portal pages should grow to direct Wikiversity participants to "learning projects" that are suitable for their level of exprience. However, some basket weaving neophyte may have the goal of becoming the sixth world expert basket weaving via teleoperated submarines. Such a Wikiversity participant might want to learn basket weaving as an "apprentice" to one of the currently existing five world experts. If there is only one student in the whole world who wants to learn basket weaving, rather than create Basket Weaving 101, it might make sense to let this basket weaving neophyte learn about basket weaving by being a helper for the advanced "teleoperated submarine-related learning project" The neophyte could be given simple tasks related to the advanced project, such as cataloging the "classic" source texts for basket weaving. This would provide the neophyte with a chance to learn basket weaving under the direction of experts and the neophyte could actually be helping to construc what would evntually serve as the Basket Weaving 101 learning project page for the (hopefully) growing Wikiversity school of basket weaving. Maybe 5 years after Wikiversity opens, Wikiversity will be recognized around the world as a great place to learn basket weaving and thousands of people will participate in Basket Weaving 101 every year. At that point, it may make sense to take groups of 20 participants into "sections" of Basket Weaving 101 so that a group of learners with similar interests could interact for a specified period of time. However, the mechanics of such is a "traditional section" is an issue to be faced in the future. At the launch of Wikiversity what is needed is a flexible system that will faciitate the creation of Wikiversity content. This means attracting peopl who will participate in "learning projects" as wiki editors who add content to Wikiversity. --JWSurf 14:24, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

 * You are very persuasive JW. I feel confident your methods will help us grow our extraterrestrial basket weaving capability as they begin to permeate our wikiversity community.  I guess your real world experience as a university professor is applicable to at least our wikiversity starting point.  Thanks for your efforts on our behalf! *) Lazyquasar 18:57, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

a couple of thoughts: 1. the idea of making alot of the "work" that the wikiversitarians do, into wiki-inspired collaborative "papers" "essays' and other kinds of interpretative texts is very intriguing as it places "students" immediately in the process of doing organized writing/critical thinking in tandem/dialogue with others. i'm not exactly sure how that would play out in terms of assignments for a particular project, but i guess we'll find out.  such a practice would also instill "students' with the wikipedian etiquette of civility and an attempt at intellectual neutrality -- which is very difficult for most people, I would say. most Americans at least don't really know how to debate issues calmly and with respect for the other discussant(s), so i see this use of the collaborative as very crucial pedagogically to what the wikiversity might be about.

2. there's a fair amount of theoretical and critical work beginning to circulate in academics about pedagogy in the humanities and on the college level in general, and heavy-duty philosopher types like Martha Nussbaum of U of Chicago have weighed in on the question of pedagogy, as have more radical folks like the african american intellectual bell hooks, and before her the Latin American thinker, Paulo Freire. so i don't know as we want to limit our understanding of the issues to "teaching and teaching styles" although these are certainly important. do we maybe want a pedagogical theory/ies section or sub-section? --Smithgrrl 05:45, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Merge from Learning community
Some stuff should either be moved into there, or out of there

Instructional scaffolding?
I think it might be useful if Wikiversity had some form of discussion software connected with it. Here's my idea of how it would work:
 * 1) On the Template:Learning project boilerplate page, have a link to a Discussion Groups page in the new, magic, discussion groups namespace.  I'll use the "Introduction to Basket Weaving project" (this is a fictional 13-lesson program, designed to be conducted over 13 weeks).
 * 2) On the Discussion Groups:Introduction to Basket Weaving, there is a list of discussion groups associated with this Learning Project, their number of participants, and the like (ie. possibly when they started, or the last time the group was emptied).  This list magically auto-updates
 * 3) Each of the discussion groups is actually just a plain old mailing list with archives.  The list could be cleared out at the end of each semester, so that old students wouldn't receive the messages from the new group, and so that the group starting date would be updated.
 * 4) We could even make queues, so that when the mailing list is cleared, the new group goes in automatically

Of course, this would require extension of the MediaWiki software. Point 1 could be done without extension. Point 2 might require some sort of modified "Category:" to be turned into the discussion group. Points 3 and 4 would be totally new.

 * We could require that people use the e-mail address associated with their Wikiversity username, so that we could match things up in the archives.

Thoughts, anyone?

TimNelson 13:00, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Self-Learning
I think because learning in wikiversity is practically Self-Learning, i think there should be some information about it in learning page. Srinivasasha 02:52, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Please feel free to edit the page. The ultimate hope is that there will be communities of learners so that individuals are not on their own. --JWSchmidt 02:56, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

title: Wikiversity talk:Learning


text:
Wikiversity:Creating a lesson plan

Creating a Lesson Plan
It is simple and easy to start or create a lesson plan at Wikiversity. This procedure is only one suggested starting point. Please modify it to express or try out your own ideas. Detailed instructions on how to write a lesson plan are available at Humboldt. Further information packets are available at the search service ask.com and/or at google.

Traditional Approach
1. Identify what you wish the participant to be able to learn from the lesson. This is often called the objective of the lesson.

 * Keep in mind the early participant's objectives may differ from your own, so they may fork and modify the material liberally. If newcomers seem to be disrupting your development it may be appropriate to suggest they forkProductive_Forking_and_Tailoring_is_Encouraged to a different Wikiversity location to pursue different objectives or styles of presentation or development.  Alternatively, it is often less vexing to slip away quietly to your own fork, after all, we do not own pages we initiate here.  Anyone is welcome to attempt to improve them.

2. Gather some initial material which can be presented to the student. Currently, at Wikiversity this includes text, pictures, and links which are easy to upload and add to the wiki page presentation database.

 * An excellent general starting point can be either http://wikipedia.org or http://wikibooks.org; both have good information and links to excellent information elsewhere. There is a search utility available at both sites or one can use the layers lists of subject/category links available from the front page.

 * A keyword search at www.google.com or some other search engine can also be very helpful.

3. Write an initial quiz and answer sheet.

4. Add an appropriate link within the existing Wikiversity hierarchy, so participants can find your material when it is of potential interest to them.

5. Add appropriate link infrastructure to place the material properly, if necessary.

6. If the initial materials seem to disappear while you are working try using the search features to find it. Someone may have assisted you by moving the material to an existing page or changing the name. If they have been mistakenly deleted as abandoned cruft, an administrator can usually undelete them for you. Local backups under your own control are always a good investment when working with large data projects. With simple stuff like paragraphs or lesson plans or links it is often easier to just recreate an improved version.

7. Add the page or its discussion page to your watchlist to make it easy to check back occasionally to answer questions or improve the material if that is your wish. This is not required. Eventually the material will be improved, forked, or pruned from the Wikiversity site unless it becomes very polished and merely archived. That is the nature of our current wiki process developed at Wikipedia and the starting point for Wikiversity's evolution.

A Random Walk on the Wild Side
1. Read a random page at Wikipedia w:Special:Random or start at a random book module at Wikibooks b:Special:Random, it will often have a layered set of links to help find a chapter, section, concept, or paragraph of interest.

2. Create a quick, concise, subject quiz using a local text editor. Include the links to the original source material at the top. Include the answers at the bottom or better yet plan to cut and paste answers to the quiz discussion page.

3. Find an appropriate place in Wikiversity learning trails, course lists, portal indexes, etc. to place the initial page link.

4. Create the page.

5. Find a few more places to link into (fan in from) the new quiz. Programmers will recognize that we are fanning out from the entry points along the learning trails and then fanning back into specific material from multiple locations.

6. Feedback loop. If interested, place the new page on your watchlist to see if it attracts interest, modification, and maintenance sufficient to prosper and mature into a brilliant polished often used resource.

Online Quizzes and Review Questions
There is useful example HTML at this Wikipedia article Seven_Bridges_of_Königsberg, and here on Wikiversity at Test and Quiz, demonstrating how to hide the answers to a question until the student decides they are ready for them.

title: Wikiversity:Creating a lesson plan


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Educational standards organisations

Overview of organisations related to educational standards and educational quality control:

Australia

 * http://www.avcc.edu.au (Australian Vice-chancellors Committee)

Western Australia

 * http://www.tac.wa.gov.au (Training Accreditation Council)
 * http://www.des.wa.gov.au (Higher Education Office of the Department of Education Services)
 * http://www.acas.wa.edu.au (Australian Centre for Advanced Studies)

Germany

 * http://www.iqb.hu-berlin.de IQB (Institut zur Qualitätsentwicklung im Bildungswesen)

 * https://www.peruzinasi.com/international-education/PN (Peruzi nasi website for international education)

Netherlands

 * http://www.minocw.nl
 * http://www.onderwijsinspectie.nl
 * http://www.citogroep.nl CITO (popular primary school test)
 * http://www.kwaliteitsring.nl
 * http://www.slo.nl SLO (Stichting Leerplan Ontwikkeling)
 * https://www.edustandaard.nl/ Edustandaard

England and Wales

 * http://www.qca.org.uk QCA (Qualifications and Curriculum Authority)
 * http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk
 * http://www.qaa.ac.uk (Quality Assurance Association for higher education)
 * http://www.jisc.ac.uk (Joint Information Systems Committee)
 * http://www.cetis.ac.uk (Centre for Educational Technology Interoperability Standards)
 * http://www.lifelonglearninguk.org (Lifelong Learning UK is the Sector Skills Council responsible for the professional development of all those working in community learning and development; further education; higher education; libraries, archives and information services; and work-based learning)

Scotland

 * http://www.sqa.org.uk SQA (Scottish Qualifications Authority)
 * http://www.scqf.org.uk SCQF (Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework)

United States

 * http://www.ncte.org NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English)
 * http://standards.nctm.org NCTM (National Council Teaching Mathmatics)

Alabama

 * http://alex.state.al.us/browseStand.php

California

 * California State Board of Education Content Standards Note: due to budget problems, the state of California is forced to depend on Internet Engineering Task Force Requests for Comments and will be investigating educational standards for instructional technologies in conjunction with Open Educational Resources (at Wikiversity) and published standards such as IMS QTI, reserving enhancements for audio upload and speech synthesis. N.B. also: Math Standard pp. 54-59 may conflict with this TED Talk as of 22:22, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Florida

 * http://www.firn.edu/doe/menu/sss.htm

Kentucky

 * http://www.education.ky.gov/kde/instructional+resources/curriculum+documents+and+resources/core+content+for+assessment.htm

New Mexico

 * http://www.ped.state.nm.us/standards/

Pennsylvania
en
 * http://www.pde.state.pa.us PDE (Pennslyvania Department of Education)

South Carolina

 * http://www.myscschools.com/offices/cso/

Texas

 * http://www.scotthochberg.com/taas.html TAKS (Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills)

title: Educational standards organisations


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Wikiversity:I Want to Know

Helping Wikiversity
(First off I apologize because I know this question isn't in the appropriate place - please inform me where I should put these types of questions in the future...) I am attending college currently, and am wondering how I can get my professors to help Wikiversity as much as possible; obviously I could tell them simply to 'go there' and explain the concept but if they have specific questions as educators, where should I point them? If we assume they are willing to put time into this project, do they have to prove their credentials, is it okay for them to submit tests or lesson material? Who answers these questions? Thanks. SolAce7x 05:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

 * After some long delays the Wikiversity is now (14 August 06) getting setup in permanent databases. If they have specific questions they can come ask them in English here:  http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Main_Page  They can submit specific questions and tests anywhere they find appropriate along the learning trails in the link mazes.  They should understand the nature of a wiki which is that anyone else may modify the material and that the material is licensed as FDL (GNU Free Documentation License) and may be modified and reused or republished in accordance with those license requirements).   Any participant who knows can answer these questions.  A more specific project/community structure will start to evolve now that we are officially active.  Welcome! Lazyquasar 10:04, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

General Relativity
Anyone know some good sources or places to start with General Relativity? Hah, what an open question. Fephisto 23:50, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

 * A search of Wikibooks finds: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/General_Relativity  This is mostly an index of mathematical treatments of some concepts useful in Relativity.
 * A potential learning group may be getting established here: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:General_Relativity
 * This seems a pretty good starting place to lookver concepts and maybe find additional material: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Relativity
 * You may wish to check back in a few months. Wikiversity is currently pending approval to proceed and this is probably suppressing interest and activity at the moment.

68.238.143.172 07:31, 3 August 2006 (UTC) user:lazyquasar

 * t'hooft has written a book which is available on-line.--Hillgentleman 15:55, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

School of Natural Sciences
Either I have missed something, or there is a glaring omission in the wikiversity: no natural science courses. Physics, Chemistry, Biology, all of these would be good resources. I know that Wikibooks has a lot of different books about these subjects, but it would be beneficial if there were course series for each of these as well.
 * http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Wikiversity_Schools Has links for these subjects. Perhaps you are looking the outdated shortlist on the front page?  Or perhaps a neophyte has made an error and deleted the layers of links leading to the active Biology portal frequented by non other than user:JWSurf http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:School_of_Biology or organization shuffling is in progress.   A search for these subjects in the Wikibooks database will find some excellent materials in the wiki books, active biology portal, and some sparse activitiy in other areas. I will check the links when I get a chance.  Thanks for reporting the problem here!  If you were logged in when you left message above and put four tildas after a space at end of the paragraph it provides a signature with link back to your personal/handle pages.  Lazyquasar 10:42, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Standard Particle Theory
What replaced the Standard Particle Theory when it was discovered that neutrinos have mass? Do we know what the range of typical speeds for neutrinos are yet? Is anyone working on developing neutrino telescopes yet?
 * Good introductory background at this link.
 * Some good discussion here.
 * Some serious handwaving here.
 * Excellent background and explanation of neutrino oscillation.
 * Wikipedia has a good overview of situation. neutrinos

Globalization & China
Who controls China's foreign policy? Communist party leaders, military leadership, or new capitalists created by rapid industrialization, urbanization and foreign capitalists pursuing offshore opportunity?

 * The Great (fire)Wall of china is blocking wiki[pm]edia btw.

Class Sign Up
I have read many articles regarding the accreditation of this online university and the ramifications of it. My question is much simplier, I am concerned where to sign up for courses of interest. Should there not be a central page where I could sign up and have updates from my instructor. I am afraid the course boils down to me learning the major points outlined in the course description on my own with no testing of the material. I am not a big fan of tests but assessment of my knowledge on the subject is a big plus.

Politic0220

 * There is no intention or ability for this Wikiversity to become accredited within a few years. First we have to build some materials, credibility and organizational structure that would be satisfactory to an official body which provides accreditation.   We are just getting started.  We hope to build a community of participants who work and study together to meet individual learning goals and simultaneously our common goal of creating free instructional material and human knowledge, present it efffectively to each other and any human being with the technology to access it.  I happened to have gotten an A in Politics 205 in at Oregon State University aproximately 20 years.  If you need an initial study partner I could track down my text or buy another one.  We cannot violate copyright so we must be careful to be paraphrasing and creating our own notes.  Plus we can use any applicable texts available on the Wikibooks bookshelves, articles in the Wikipedia, and information available elsewhere on the web, personally accessible libraries, etc.  If you are interested leave a note on my discussion page.  user:lazyquasar  Ignore the "It's Dead Jim" message.  You and I can create a few sparks to possibly help it ignite again.

 * Update. There has been some activity here.  http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:School_of_Political_Science  Apparently severl participants are already active in the poly sci area.  Keep in mind there are no credentials at Wikiversity so far only participants who have registered like yourself.  If you find yourself in conflict with the "Department Heads" or "Instructors" simply start your own study group.  The appropriate designation for all of us at this time is "participant".  We are studying together while creating free materials that express human knowledge for our common posterity.  user:lazyquasar

How to assist classes?
I read many pages in wikiversity but couldn't find how to assist classes. Are they over irc or like a video conversation or just by typing in wiki pages? I specially want to get info about politics and business classes. Thanks in advance.

 * Does "assist" mean "attend"?

 * Wikiversity is in the process of being reviewed, finalized, and activated by a proposal committee chargedd with showing the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Director how we intend to operate initially. We start with some awesome assets.   Once final approval is achieved a dedicated set of wiki's at wikiversity.org in various languages as participants show up.  Basically we do not have structured classes at this time we are trying to get some study groups up and running.  These will start to develop learning trails and leave useful materials behind for the next participants who show up.  The German Wikiveristy is already active and to my certain knowledge several French graduate students have swung by looking for applicable processes they could use and help out with.   They were disappointed that the French wiki was not already active but we gave them adresses for the Board so this may be ready to change as soon as we have approval to proceed across the board instead of prototyping within this temporary space.  We can easily link to Wikipedia and other wikimedia projects such as Wikibooks, Wiktionary,  Commons (multimedia, photographs, and other stuff or components used by multiple Wikimedia projects) as well as the rest of the Web.   Groups of participants can use other resources like IRC, external mailing lists, etc. etc. and link to or cut and paste as long as care is taken to get appropriate permissions to respect everyone's expectation of privacy issues and personal copyright inherit in private or public writing.   Notice when material is submitted to this and the soon to be Wikiversity English site the submittal form requires submitter to know they are publishing the material appropriately under the FDL free documentation license.  See above about politics.  I operated a business for eight years and have some books around.  If you wish to a study group of some kind started regarding business leave a note on my user discussion page (click on signature link and then the discussion tab at top of my user page) and maybe we can get it going and attract some more high and low end participation to make it really worth your while. user:lazyquasar

 * Update. I could not find any recent activity here http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:School_of_Business.  It is probably pending approval of our dedicated wikispace at URL wikiversity.org.

There is a significant link structure leading back various Wikibooks under construction. By checking the history page and following user names you might find some people interested in Business. Alternatively, go to the appropriate shelf at the Books by subject tab to the left and look for user handles. Strike up a discussion at their user page and see if anyone is interested in a study group focusing on your current specific interests. user:lazyquasar

title: Wikiversity:I Want to Know


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Wikiversity:Vision

Vision statements
Here are some possible vision statements. Feel free to create alternative versions, make comments, improve, etc.:

 * Our vision is to create a world where everyone has resources to freely learn about anything and everything, both known and unknown, in order to better themselves and society.

 * Our vision is to create a world in which everyone can freely access and develop learning resources in any topic, and to build knowledge for themselves and society.

 * Wikiversity's vision is to create freely accessible and editable learning resources for all people and subject areas.

Extended vision statement
[A vision needs more than a single sentence statement (though it needs that too!) - so this section is to develop such a vision.]

Wikiversity intends to be a comprehensive repository of learning resources and knowledge in all subjects, for all ages and types of learners. It also intends to be a space for learning - through collaborating, participating, discussing, and questioning. Wikiversity strives to create an open platform in which people can connect with others in order to learn - as well as offering a means for self-study, or creating a more personalised space for learning. Wikiversity is also open to questioning and discussion around how Wikiversity works - it is a self-reflexive experiment in learning, the 'wiki way'.

Many individual visions exist for Wikiversity, just as many methods and ideologies exist around learning. For example, some people like to think of Wikiversity as an evolution of the ancient Grecian discursive model of learning, and others believe that it should be a more formalised, didactic system. In practice, Wikiversity strives to be as inclusive of these visions as possible - though it does operate within a wiki methodology, and therefore does have a strong bias towards openness and collaboration. However, true to its experimental roots, Wikiversity is in a constant engagement with how best to provide for an open learning platform and repository. Your own vision is welcome...

Detailed vision

 * A vision also needs meat on the bones. Thus, a detailed vision for 2009 is currently being fleshed out - contributions welcome.

No vision statement

 * Is a vision statement necessary, in addition to a mission statement? (e.g., perhaps the Vision could be considered as the package of Motto, Slogan, Mission, Strategy, etc.?)

Connection with sister projects

 * Check how the structure of vision, mission, goals, slogans, mottos, etc. is set up on other WMF projects, and the WM foundation itself.
 * Check how the proposed WV vision connects/disconnects with sister projects and the WMF.

Wikimedia Foundation

 * Vision

title: Wikiversity:Vision


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Wikiversity:Alternative Theory

WikiVersity seems to be a little bit stuck. And the reasons seem quite obvious:

 * It is tougher to develop a flexible Meta-structure than a great though relatively limited catchword structure like Wikipedia.

Finally Wikipedia will be only a tool for Wikiversity like a “classical” Encyclopedia for a “classical” university.

The like will be Wikibooks. Therefore Wikiversity does not fit into the Wikibooks section nor its structure.

 * There is no need for copying structures of the “book-world” to the internet. Books are built on a couple of limitations that the internet doesn’t have:

 * Mainly one categorizing structure
 * Limited space
 * One (or a very limited number of) point of view(s)
 * Limited format --> This point is crucial actually as we have transferred most of this limitation to our digital output architecture

So the catchwords for general philosophy are multi categorization, intelligent linking and great variety of aspects, view on limitations of theories, practical application, historical development etc. for each topic.

Especially one fault should not be made: Transferring the current structure of scientific subject groups (which have developed mainly due to certain – historical – limitations) to a 21st century education resource. They should only be a comparative part, one of many categorization possibilities. Having multi-aspects at hand will be the MAIN ADVANTAGE of the future Wikiversity.

Let me give a striking example of what I mean:

* For a person like Freud, sexuality is the main reference point – everything is a sexual act: Communication is sexual, Social Organization bases on  sexuality etc. * For a pure capitalist, the market is the sole driving force and regulates everything, especially the Social Organization.

Therefore Social Organization can be looked at in a Freudian way or in a capitalist way or in many different other ways, which should all be shown. Only then critical comparison will be possible.

So for this point I suggest that the courses should not be structured like a book but rather like a Matrix. Books should only be used as references.

 * Developing own aspects of a topic will be an important part of the learning process.

 * What has been said for the book structure is even more true for the content. There is no need for a single scientific style and its dry theoretical texts. Wikiversity learning should be fun, fun, fun and expanding the horizon – for both, the teacher and the student.

Anyway, the line between those two will be floating – interaction and role changing will evolve.

 * Before we think about grades and marks etc. we have to build up the world’s best educational material: interdisciplinary, interesting, understandable, vivid. Example

Everything else will develop :-).

The wikiversity should specify prerequisites for learning course material. For instance, if you are studying Calculus there should be a prerequisites section with links to various other material you should have already mastered. Also there should be many different methodologies and ways of teaching the same ideas and there should be alternate routes for learning things. For instance a person learning complex analysis could decide to take a more visual route, a more mathematically rigorous route or an more engineering like route. The wikipedia should offer many different pathways to reach from one point of knowledge to a higher point. One of the problems with making the wikiversity too interdisplanary and reducing the barriers between subjects is that it makes courses less modular. As courses become less modular the prerequisites for each course increase and it becomes harder for a given person to meet the prerequisites. The course also becomes longer and teach a lot of stuff the learner does not really need to know. This is why it is probably in many case better to have discrete learning units and also to have books. They increase the modularity of knowledge, decrease the prerequisites and thus reduce the barriers to knowledge. Thus the wikiversity community should be very careful before we dismiss the traditional ideas of displines and books completely. I think there should be several possible options a person can take. For instance if a person is learning calculus, there could be a very mathematical path like what would be seen in Spivak's Calculus, a more engineering oriented path which focusses on calculations and using calculus to do engineering type problems and finally an extremely rich and beautiful path which covers everyting, the math, the engineering/physics applications, the history the interconnections etc.

Anyway, I am not saying that a more radical interdisciplinary approach with fewer barriers between subjects is a bad idea. I am just trying to approach things from the learners point of view and his/her individual needs which will require different emphasises, different pedogagical styles and as few prerequisites as possible.

- Please check out alexevasion and his ideas at [b:Wikiversity:School_of_Social_Science]

title: Wikiversity:Alternative Theory


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User:JWSchmidt/Example

Welcome to Wikiversity!

universitas magistrorum et scholarium - a community of teaching and learning - is the basic definition of a university in Latin. Wikiversity is the viciversitas magistrorum et scholarium - a wiki-based community of teaching and learning.

Wikiversity is not a degree-granting institution. It does not have professors or staff or registered students. There are just people here

in many different subjects.

Wikiversity is a communal effort to learn and facilitate others' learning. You can use Wikiversity to find information or ask questions about a subject you need to find out more about. You can also use it to share your knowledge about a subject, and to build learning materials around that knowledge. See below for ideas on how you can help out yourself, or to help us help you.

Some open tasks

 * Requested features - plans for new Wikiversity features
 * plans for new learning projects - existing projects
 * Helpdesk - ask for that nugget of information you need, or answer it for someone else
 * Subjects - browse the subject catalogue within Wikiversity
 * MetaData - check out the meta data catalogue for some heavy-duty searching
 * Communities - browse active learning communities in Wikiversity
 * Wikiversity:Learning materials project - start adding learning materials yourself!

title: User:JWSchmidt/Example


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Wikiversity:Stream/Circle

Circle - Introduction

History:

In ancient times the circle, due to its perfect symmetrical properties, was believed to be divine.

So not only was it symbol for the sun, but all the planets had to move around the Earth in circular movements as well.

As this did not match observations, tricky adaptations of combined circular movements were constructed. It was Kepler who proposed the concept of elliptic planet movements.

Qualitative description:

A circle is a FLAT, ROUND FORM, it has NO BEGINNING and NO END, it has a CENTER, it looks very SYMMETRICAL.

Additionally a circle is relatively ABSTRACT, we do not find perfect circles in nature, but close approximations.

Examples:

The full moon appears as a really nice circle.

If we cut a pineapple in the middle, its center looks like a circle.

Crop circles (believed by some to be produced by Aliens) are sometimes very good circular approximations.

Construction:

Hold a small tree, stretch your arm, and walk around the tree. When you reach the starting point again, you have just constructed a circle.

We have found the basic property of circles here: At any position on the circle, our distance to the centre point (in our case: the tree) is the same.

Other constructional possibilities are a horizontal cut of a cone or the straight projection of a sphere.

Mathematical definition:

In the mathematical language we formulate our observations like this: A circle is a two-dimensional geometrical form, whose points all have a constant distance from a common center point.

Technical Application:

There are two very important technical aspects:

 * Circles provide the largest area in relation to their periphery
 * Forms with circular cross section (e.g. cylinders) provide the best possible stability against certain forces (pressure and torque)

Similar Forms:

 * Ellipse: A circle can also be regarded as a special form of ellipse with coincidental focal points.

 * Sphere: A sphere can be regarded as a three dimensional (rotating) circle.

 * Straight line: Contradictory as it may sound, a straight line can be regarded as a circle with infinite radius. Very strange property of this straight circle – it has an infinite number of central points in infinity.

Other Languages:

 * French:  le cercle
 * German:  der Kreis
 * Italian: il cerchio
 * Spanish: el círculo

Exercise:

Try to draw a couple of circles free-handed. Calligraphers have perfected this technique and draw extremely exact circles.

See also:

Circle on Wikipedia

title: Wikiversity:Stream/Circle


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Talk:Educational standards organisations

Why isn't there anything regarding Canada here? --FreshFruitsRule-WB 13:10, 11 August 2006 (UTC)


text: User:JWSchmidt/Wikiversity template

title: User:JWSchmidt/Wikiversity template


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School:Physics/Bachelor of Science/Feedback

This is intended for feedback on current Bachelor of Science in Physics degree programs


text:
Wikiversity talk:Vision

Comments on older versions of page
After reading this article I have no idea what is the vision of Wikiversity. Though, the description of Classical education (which may be biased) was entertaining, it helps me very little to understand the function of Wikiversity. Is this an attempt to define vision based on a problem-solution organization? If so, neither the problem nor vision has been developed.--68.222.30.194 21:42, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

pls visit b:User_talk:Humble_Guy, I have suggestions....

please visit my suggestion too: Odzilla --Catpad 08:48, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Updated page
I think it's good to have this simplified page as one we can link people to to explain what Wikiversity is (though we need to keep these introductory pages in line with each other). I think it's a good idea to work on a single sentence vision statement, as well as an extended vision statement (one or two paragraphs). I've made a start on such an extended vision statement, and I've left it that "Your own vision is welcome...", having previously said that there are many individual visions for Wikiversity (which there are - eg Vision/Historical perspective). I wonder if, instead of this page becoming a patchwork quilt of everyone's individual visions, we should encourage people to be as bold as they like with their own individual visions by setting up a page (perhaps a subpage of this one) which outlined their views? Cormaggio talk 12:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

WikiCredentials
Hello Friends, Teachers and Fellow Students, My name is Gaon, and I firmly believe Wikiversity should include " WikiCredentials " ( WikiCreds ) upon the completion of Testing courses. This would inspire Millions around the world to learn and challenge our societies present accredidation system... and change our culture's perception of credentialism.

It is time for freedom of thought to Flourish, where anyone can learn and be accredited, regardless of age, mental capacity, location, economic status or the inability to pay tuition. Wikiversity could rival and surpass the Best education available, If we have the desire and diligence to fulfill this Grand Vision........

it would be The Most Good for the Most People, Literally, Billions of people.

Do we have what it takes to fulfill this expansive, innovative and BOLD endeavor?

Kind regards, Intelligent Discussion Welcomed.

Sincerely Gaon Yincang Abhinava 03:09, 23 July 2011 (UTC) 7/22/2011 10:08pm
 * Gaon created a page which I have moved to Wikicredentials, and started a Colloquium discussion which I've moved to Talk for the Wikicredentials page. --Abd 14:01, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Share your learning curve
Recently I found a TED talk from Joris Luyendijk, a Dutch journalist (see link below).

TED-filmpje

In this TED talk he explains that people should share their lightbulb-moments. When many people do this, knowledge gaps will be bridged.

I think the wikiversity project should include the thought of sharing lightbulb-moments. This is something else then only sharing learning resources.

What do you think?

Tim, Timboliu (talk) 11:26, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

Wikiversity versus wikibooks
In 2014 all 5000 pages on the Dutch wikiversity (still in beta) were removed because the did not meet the quality standards of the Dutch community. In 2015 we want to start with a new learning project around programming language Scratch. The plan for 2015 is to involve the Dutch community in creating this learning project. Some questions arose. One of the questions was: "why not create a wikibook instead of creating learning material on wikiversity?". What is the difference between wikibooks and wikiversity? Timboliu (discuss • contribs) 19:38, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

 * Wikibooks is open content textbooks. Wikiversity is open learning projects and resources.  For an example of the differences, consider a book and a lesson plan.  A book explains the concept.  A lesson plan pulls together a variety of resources to help learn the concept.  Technically, one might even argue that an effective lesson plan must include reading, media, and hands-on activities to address all learning styles.  The common understanding of 'textbook' is insufficient to meet that perspective.  And unfortunately, there are too many resources at Wikiversity that are nothing more than textbook chapters or encyclopedia articles.  The only significant learning activity provided was for the author, rather the user community.

 * But, rather than asking us to define the difference between Wikibooks and Wikiversity, you would be better off asking the Dutch community what they perceive the differences to be, if that's where the content will be created. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 21:17, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Propposals

 * Our vision is to live in a world with a virtual Worldwide University where everybody can freely learn and develop about anything and everything to better themselves and society. --

title: Wikiversity talk:Vision


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Wikiversity talk:Alternative Theory

Hello !

This is a very interesting approach! I had somewhow similar ideas for some time now and even prepared the description of my new "educational idea" called Odzilla. Please, take a look. My guess is that the structured information organization that I represent there can be used for the cross-cultural and interdisciplinary approach to education that you describe. Maybe my ideas may contribute to the Wikiversity project that needs a boost.

--Catpad 07:17, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

title: Wikiversity talk:Alternative Theory


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User:JWSchmidt/Wikiversity Community

The Wikiversity community is participating in an experiment in education. Just what can be done with wiki technology as a tool for education? In order to answer this question, Wikiversity is devoted to supporting constructive interactions between Wikiversity participants. Wikiversity is devoted to individuals and individuality. Conventional "bricks and mortar" universities are constrained by the expense of existing in physical space. Conventional universities tend to clump students together in to groups for a coordinated "factory" approach to "assembly line" education. Wikiversity exists in a virtual learning space where the individual interests and needs of learners can be respected.

Active learning
In order for Wikiversity to serve individual needs, it is important that each Wikiversity participant to be an ACTIVE LEARNER. This means sharing your interests, goals and educational experiences with other members of the Wikiversity community. By sharing, others will learn of your needs and help point you towards resources and activities that will serve your needs. By sharing your experiences you move out of your personal world of learning into the Wikiversity community space where learners help build Wikiversity while they learn. The distinction between learner and teacher is very flexible within Wikiversity. No matter what you are learning, there will almost always be other Wikiversity participants who can learn something from you.

"I want someone to teach me FOO." At Wikiversity, who is that "someone"? If we all adopt the spirit of community learning, then we realize that "someone" is US. Particularly at the launch of Wikiversity we must all engage in learning projects and participate in the construction of Wikiversity. The Wikipedia model Today, there are many people who are simple "users" of Wikipedia, people who read the content of Wikipedia but do not edit Wikipedia articles. At the start of Wikipedia (when there was no content), there could be no simple users.....Wikipedia participants had to be active editors and create the content. Wikiversity is in a similar situation and needs active participants who can be both learners and wiki editors. However, it is the goal of Wikiversity that its participants will always be active wiki editors, even after there is a large amount of "educational content" and "learning materials" in Wikiversity.

Learning Projects Wikiversity is devoted to active learning and learning by doing. The fundamental unit of Wikiversity community structure is the Learning Project. Learning Projects are wiki pages where groups of interested participants come together to share questions, ideas, and answers as they explore a topic. An individual's learning goals are met within Wikiversity by participation in suitable Learning Projects. It is up to each of us to design and participate in the Learning Projects that will allow us to grow towards our goals. Reach out and join in.

 "what we didn‘t understand at that time is how to build a community and how to empower a community to do good work" (source)

Where are the courses?
There is nothing that prevents Wikiversity participants from leading and attending conventional courses within Wikiversity. However, the wiki user interface is not well-suited for conventional courses. Wikiversity participants are encouraged to innovate and create learning experiences that take full advantage of the wiki format for online community interactions. Non-traditional Learning Projects oriented towards learning about conventional course subjects are encouraged within Wikiversity. See: Learning.

Kinds of Wikiversity Communities
All Wikiversity activities are oriented around learning. Two special types of activities are service activities and research activities.
 * Learning community
 * Service community
 * Research community

title: User:JWSchmidt/Wikiversity Community


text:
Wikiversity talk:Stream/Circle

I'm not sure what the original intention of this page was. I'd like to add some links from it to Wikiversity pages. This one page could be an entry point to all of human knowledge. --JWSurf 14:18, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

title: Wikiversity talk:Stream/Circle


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User:JWSchmidt/Learning Community

A learning community is a group of people all connected by a common educational or developmental goal. It is an idea which is used in various educational settings as a way to increase motivation and ultimately to empower the learner in constructing their own meanings and methods in addressing the particular problem or issue they are currently working on. Attributes of a learning community typically include being collaborative, decentralised and distributed, much as, and for the same reasons that Communities of Practice (CoPs) are also applied, both in educational and business settings.

Wikipedia
Wikipedia (along with all other Wikimedia projects) are potentially such learning communities. To illustrate: pick a page on Wikipedia, any page. Look at its history page - make sure it has been written by a number of contributors (some articles are still predominantly the work of a single individual!). Now take a look at its talk page. What do you find? Usually a mix of questions, points, criticisms; in other words, suggestions to improve the article from their perspective.

Here we have a group of people engaged in negotiating the meaning and scope of the article. Let's pick this sentence apart:
 * "a group of people": These people may not consider themselves a community, let alone a group, yet they are nevertheless here for a reason - the shared goal of improving the article
 * "engaged in": In the process of writing/improving the article, they are developing a praxis - a way of working. They develop ways of asking questions, of talking to each other, and of addressing their goal with respect to their own needs and those of the article itself
 * "negotiating the meaning and scope of the article": This is obviously what takes the most time, especially in contentious articles. "I find this picture offensive and think it should be removed immediately." "Shouldn't this article be merged with/redirected to ..?" "Are these people terrorists or freedom fighters?"

Obviously, what people are interested in in Wikipedia is creating a satisfactory (if not excellent) end-product; what a learning community is about, however, is the process. But the two are inseparable; the product is created by the process - it is a collaborative encylopedia. Therefore, the work of Wikipedia(ns) is negotiating the process as much as creating the product (if not more so). What is crucial here is to remain self-critically aware of our discourse, which is how Wikipedia works but also how it breaks down in occasional circumstances.

Applications
A common technique in traditional class settings is for a teacher/facilitator to assign people into groups, where the learners are given an activity and carry it out between them within a specified time, like for example to have a discussion, do some research and write a report on their findings. Many e-learning environments replicate this sort of activity and framework, utilising environments like WebCT or Moodle to manage and facilitate the students' interactions. Wikis are inherently collaborative structures that can be used to these ends, albeit in a slightly altered form. Wikimedia's e-learning resource-in-development/waiting, Wikiversity could easily work along these lines.

But..
It is all too easy to simply say every group working together is a learning community. It is more correct that it can be a learning community, depending on how the task is defined and negotiated by the learners themselves. Returning to the idea of being collaborative, decentralised and distributed; we must also add that people in a proper, functioning learning community themselves really feel that they are a part of that community and that they actually participate. We know that in some groups, some people will take over and some people will feel excluded. This is not to say that all work in a learning community has to be shared equally (some learning communities will develop hierarchical elements); but rather to ensure that each individual feels they can add anything at any time and that each individual's needs have to be recognised in order for it to be a functioning learning community.

title: User:JWSchmidt/Learning Community


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User:Brooke Vibber

meta:User:Brion VIBBER

it:Utente:Brion VIBBER

title: User:Brooke Vibber


text: Template:WikiversityUsers

title: Template:WikiversityUsers


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Template talk:WikiversityUsers

I will be creating a set of new pages such as Wikiversity community. This template will be used on Wikiversity pages to guide Wikiversity participants into the Wikiversity community. Feel free to join in! --JWSurf 17:18, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

title: Template talk:WikiversityUsers


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text: Template:Babel

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Template:Babel html head

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text: Template:Babel field M

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Wikiversity:Wikiversity community

The Wikiversity community is participating in an experiment in education. Just what can be done with wiki technology as a tool for education? In order to answer this question, Wikiversity is devoted to supporting constructive interactions between Wikiversity participants. Wikiversity is devoted to individuals and individuality. Conventional "bricks and mortar" universities are constrained by the expense of existing in physical space. Conventional universities tend to clump students together in to groups for a coordinated "factory" approach to "assembly line" education. Wikiversity exists in a virtual learning space where the individual interests and needs of learners can be respected.

Active learning
In order for Wikiversity to serve individual needs, it is important that each Wikiversity participant to be an ACTIVE LEARNER. This means sharing your interests, goals and educational experiences with other members of the Wikiversity community. By sharing, others will learn of your needs and help point you towards resources and activities that will serve your needs. By sharing your experiences you move out of your personal world of learning into the Wikiversity community space where learners help build Wikiversity while they learn. The distinction between learner and teacher is very flexible within Wikiversity. No matter what you are learning, there will almost always be other Wikiversity participants who can learn something from you.

"I want someone to teach me FOO." At Wikiversity, who is that "someone"? If we all adopt the spirit of community learning, then we realize that "someone" is US. Particularly at the launch of Wikiversity we must all engage in learning projects and participate in the construction of Wikiversity.

The Wikipedia model Today, there are many people who are simple "users" of Wikipedia, people who read the content of Wikipedia but do not edit Wikipedia articles. At the start of Wikipedia (when there was no content), there could be no simple users.....Wikipedia participants had to be active editors and create the content. Wikiversity is in a similar situation and needs active participants who can be both learners and wiki editors. However, it is the goal of Wikiversity that its participants will always be active wiki editors, even after there is a large amount of "educational content" and "learning materials" in Wikiversity.

Learning Projects Wikiversity is devoted to active learning and learning by doing. The fundamental unit of Wikiversity community structure is the Learning Project. Learning Projects are wiki pages where groups of interested participants come together to share questions, ideas, and answers as they explore a topic. An individual's learning goals are met within Wikiversity by participation in suitable Learning Projects. It is up to each of us to design and participate in the Learning Projects that will allow us to grow towards our goals. Reach out and join in.

 "what we didn‘t understand at that time is how to build a community and how to empower a community to do good work" (source)

Where are the courses?
There is nothing that prevents Wikiversity participants from leading and attending conventional courses within Wikiversity. However, the wiki user interface is not well-suited for conventional courses and the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees has directed the Wikiversity community away from courses (the Board's comments). Wikiversity participants are encouraged to innovate and create learning experiences that take full advantage of the wiki format for online community interactions. Non-traditional Learning Projects and other projects oriented towards learning about conventional course subjects are encouraged within Wikiversity. See: Learning.

People can learn when they edit wikis. Wikibooks has one kind of learning project: make textbooks. Wikipedia has one kind of learning project: make encyclopedia articles. Wikiversity is the place for every kind of learning project that does not already take place at other Wikimedia projects.....that is the special role for Wikiversity.....the creation of many new learning projects that support the learning goals of Wikiversity participants.

Kinds of Wikiversity Communities
All Wikiversity activities are oriented around learning. Two special types of activities are service activities and research activities.
 * Learning community
 * Service community
 * Research community

title: Wikiversity:Wikiversity community


text:
Wikiversity talk:Wikiversity community

Imported from the meta wiki

title: Wikiversity talk:Wikiversity community


text:
Wikiversity:Example

Welcome to Wikiversity!

Universitas magistrorum et scholarium—a community of teaching and learning—is the basic definition of a university in Latin. Wikiversity is the viciversitas magistrorum et scholarium—a wiki-based community of teaching and learning.

Wikiversity is not a degree-granting institution. It does not have professors or staff or registered students. There are just people here

in many different subjects.

Wikiversity is a communal effort to learn and facilitate others' learning. You can use Wikiversity to find information or ask questions about a subject you need to find out more about. You can also use it to share your knowledge about a subject, and to build learning materials around that knowledge. See below for ideas on how you can help out yourself, or to help us help you.

Some open tasks

 * Requested features - plans for new Wikiversity features
 * plans for new learning projects - existing projects
 * Help desk - ask for that nugget of information you need, or answer it for someone else
 * Browse - browse the subject catalogue within Wikiversity
 * MetaData - check out the meta data catalogue for some heavy-duty searching
 * Portal:Learning Projects - browse active learning communities in Wikiversity
 * Learning materials projects - start adding learning materials yourself!

title: Wikiversity:Example


text:
User:Garrett

Hi! This is my me page!

You might recognise me from Wikibooks or the Academic Publishing Wiki.

Nothing much to see here at the moment. Yes, this page is boring.

Todo
This list will both give you an idea of what I'm up to here and also help remind me to do them. :)
 * merge Learning (Wikibooks) and Learning (Meta) into Learning. The way I see it this is (or could be) a crucial "What is Wikiversity?" sort of page. Done! Now to get it moved to Learning...
 * check for orphaned Wikiversity: pages on Wikibooks and Meta (there's bound to be some)
 * rewrite Library services; using CC content (especially NC!) is probably a Bad Idea.

title: User:Garrett


text:
Wikiversity:Learning community

A learning community is a group of people who are all connected by a common educational or developmental goal. It is an idea which is used in various educational settings as a way to increase motivation and ultimately to empower the learner in constructing their own meanings and methods in addressing the particular problem or issue they are currently working on. Attributes of a learning community typically include being collaborative, decentralised and distributed, much as, and for the same reasons that Communities of Practice (CoPs) are also applied, both in educational and business settings.

Wikipedia
Wikipedia (along with all other Wikimedia projects) are potentially such learning communities. To illustrate: pick a page on Wikipedia, any page. Look at its history page - make sure it has been written by a number of contributors (some articles are still predominantly the work of a single individual!). Now take a look at its talk page. What do you find? Usually a mix of questions, points, criticisms; in other words, suggestions to improve the article from their perspective.

Here we have a group of people engaged in negotiating the meaning and scope of the article. Let's pick this sentence apart:
 * "a group of people": These people may not consider themselves a community, let alone a group, yet they are nevertheless here for a reason - the shared goal of improving the article
 * "engaged in": In the process of writing/improving the article, they are developing a praxis - a way of working. They develop ways of asking questions, of talking to each other, and of addressing their goal with respect to their own needs and those of the article itself
 * "negotiating the meaning and scope of the article": This is obviously what takes the most time, especially in contentious articles. "I find this picture offensive and think it should be removed immediately." "Shouldn't this article be merged with/redirected to ..?" "Are these people terrorists or freedom fighters?"

Obviously, what people are interested in Wikipedia is creating a satisfactory (if not excellent) end-product; what a learning community is about, however, is the process. But the two are inseparable; the product is created by the process - it is a collaborative encylopedia. Therefore, the work of Wikipedia(ns) is negotiating the process as much as creating the product (if not more so). What is crucial here is to remain self-critically aware of our discourse, which is how Wikipedia works but also how it breaks down in occasional circumstances.

Applications
A common technique in traditional class settings is for a teacher/facilitator to assign people into groups, where the learners are given an activity and carry it out between them within a specified time, like for example to have a discussion, do some research and write a report on their findings. Many e-learning environments replicate this sort of activity and framework, utilising environments like Blackboard, Brightspace, or Moodle to manage and facilitate the students' interactions. Wikis are inherently collaborative structures that can be used to these ends, albeit in a slightly altered form. Wikimedia's e-learning resource Wikiversity could easily work along these lines.

But..
It is all too easy to simply say every group working together is a learning community. It is more correct that it can be a learning community, depending on how the task is defined and negotiated by the learners themselves. Returning to the idea of being collaborative, decentralised and distributed; we must also add that people in a proper, functioning learning community themselves really feel that they are a part of that community and that they actually participate. We know that in some groups, some people will take over and some people will feel excluded. This is not to say that all work in a learning community has to be shared equally (some learning communities will develop hierarchical elements); but rather to ensure that each individual feels they can add anything at any time and that each individual's needs have to be recognised in order for it to be a functioning learning community.

title: Wikiversity:Learning community


text:
Wikiversity talk:Learning community

Imported from the meta wiki

This page is informed by my research on Wikipedia and its sister projects, which culminated in my masters dissertation. I presented a shorter paper at Wikimania 2005. Details can be found from my Wikipedia user page. However, I'd encourage anyone with a idea of how this page should be to contribute to its content - it's still very sketchy. --Cormaggio @ 10:47, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

wikipedia-wikiversity links
Sometimes wikipedia articles or groups of articles turn into exciting community learning projects. However, the emergence of this kind of community learning within wikipedia is a relatively rare epiphenomenon that is not adequately supported at this time. The general wikipedia community is still learning ways engage and empower editors who wish to become part of these spontaneous learning communities.

I have been thinking about an organized role for wikiversity as a facilitator of community learning projects. People who come to wikipedia could be encouraged to ask questions and demand more than what is in existing wikipedia articles. How could wikiversity play a role in this? I have been thinking about what should be said on the navigation boxes that will link wikipedia pages to wikiversity. First, such navigation boxes could encourage wikipedia users to ask questions. Wikipedia could provide "courses" in how to do literature review and source checking for topics that appear on wikipedia pages. For example, many people come to wikipedia looking for information about a particular health problem or disease. Wikiversity could have a course that empowers people who seek medical information by showing them how to access information that goes beyond what is in the wikipedia articles for health topics. Such wikiversity courses would start as "service courses" that function to improve wikipedia. From this service function, wikiversity "course pages" could grow to have detailed guides to publications and sources relevant to specific topics and contain much more detail than anyone wants in an encyclopedia. These "living reviews" of wikipedia topics might initially be a major part of the content of wikiversity. Wikipedia users who are really interested in a particular topic could be encouraged to compile subsets of the wikiversity knowledge base into formal peer-reviewed publications about topics and also to work on related textbooks at wikibooks. Textbook construction would be a natural part of the wikiversity community (see). Wikiversity could serve as a nexus for coordinating many learning and research-related activities that would benefit other wiki projects. Wikiversity would become a support system for learning communities that would interdigitate with all other wikimedia projects. --JWSurf 02:13, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

title: Wikiversity talk:Learning community


text:
Portal:Life Sciences

ja:Portal:生命科学

title: Portal:Life Sciences


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User talk:Garrett

Garrett, good to have you back with us :-). Finally, we have Wikiversity! Cormaggio 22:50, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

title: User talk:Garrett


text:
Category:Engineering and Technology

The Engineering and Technology category has Portal:Engineering and Technology. The subcategories corresponding to individual schools (such as School:Engineering) should be categorized under this category.

ja:Category:工学と技術

title: Category:Engineering and Technology


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Category:Categories

This is the root category of Wikiversity. No pages should be in this category — they should be filed under an appropriate subcategory.

This should also be the only category that is not in any parent category.

See Categories for policies, procedures and more information about the categorization of Wikiversity.

title: Category:Categories


text:
Category:Humanities

is a top-level Library of Congress Classification and Wikiversity category. Subcategories are based on Outline of the humanities.

title: Category:Humanities


text:
Category:Interdisciplinary Studies

ja:Category:学際的研究

title: Category:Interdisciplinary Studies


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Category:Professions

The Professions category contains all schools and divisions for professions and their respective categories. This category has a Portal.

what about carpentry

title: Category:Professions