Why Wikipedia Works When It Shouldn't

When I first heard about Wikipedia I was extremely skeptical. How can a technology open to everyone no matter his or her credentials (or intent) produce a viable encyclopedia populated with reliable information? Why should I be confident of a wiki's reliability when there is no expert oversight?

This article from The New York Times (Wikipedia: Exploring Fact City) is an insightful analysis of why Wikipedia works as well as it does.  It likens the website to a city where people implicitly agree to live and work together for the benefit of all.  Like a city, the freedom and good faith of hundreds of thousands of "citizens" makes it a dynamic and interesting source of information in ways that an expert site never could be. The analogy of Wikipedia as a dynamic and interesting urban environment is wonderful food for thought. 

For the first time I have been able to understand why an enyclopedia that does not rely on experts can be a reliable source of information.  In fact, the article points out that the lack of expert oversight is actually wiki's strength; and it applauds Wikipedia for having resisted the call for expert oversight throughout its existence.

I highly recommend this article to anyone who, like me, has wondered why Wikipedia (or New York City for that matter!) works when arguably it shouldn't.

Creating a Teacher's Webpage

Add this to my list of technology firsts inspired by this class: I am in the process of creating my own Teachers webpage on the Scholastic website. It is fictitious at this point, but it is fun to pretend that I am teaching American History to high school students who will find this page interesting and helpful. I also think a page like this would be a very useful tool for parents to get a sense for what is going on in the classroom, on our field trip, etc.

The scholastic webpage is free so in all fairness, I probably can't be too critical about the fact that I find it cumbersome. I also think that the ability to add graphics, change fonts, etc. is very limited. Much more limited, in fact, than the webquest site we worked with (also free) to make our webquests. I'm curious if any other students have the same observations.

Warning! Reading Blogs May Be Bad for You

I think it's time to post an opposing view to all of our exuberant praise for blogging and the way technology gives us access to news.

Don't get me wrong-- I'm not a Luddite and I value technology as much as everyone.  But the fact is that technology is changing the way we receive and share news.  And I don't think that we students have done a particularly good job focusing an observant and critical eye on these changes.

Rather than do it myself, I would like to direct you to a Op-Ed piece posted this week by Nicholas Kristof at the New York Times.  His article is titled "The Daily Me" which is a phrase coined by Nicholas Negroponte of M.I.T. to refer to our our ability to go online and use technology to select the news we want to read.  

He calls it the "daily me" because, of course, we pick the news sources from which we want to read.  And as has been pointed out in several studies on the topic "there’s pretty good evidence that we generally don’t truly want good information — but rather information that confirms our prejudices. We may believe intellectually in the clash of opinions, but in practice we like to embed ourselves in the reassuring womb of an echo chamber."

As I read this article, I thought about our St Peter's blogs.  Many of us (including me) have posted blogs praising all the wonderful technologies to which we have been introduced. And there's nothing wrong with that. But what has bothered me is that I haven't seen blogs that say "Hey, Wait a minute. Are we really considering all the angles here?  What might be the negatives to all our positives?"

Again, I risk sounding like a technology scrooge here. But c'mon students, where's the critical thinking.  Where's the opposing viewpoint?

I don't generally agree with the Op-Ed pieces of Nicholas Kristof because on most issues he's far more conservative than me.  But I read his column regularly.  I can't say the same for the blog literature I read-- it all looks alot alike.  Thank you Mr. Kristof for helping me see the narrowness of my own perspective.     

Here is an interesting article from the New York Times about new classroom designs that offer students opportunities to stand while learning.  I found this interesting because while student teaching 8th grade social studies I have noticed that some students have real difficulties sitting still in a conventional environment.  I don't think that this article has the solution to a very complex issue/problem, but I think its great that it is being addressed in innovative ways.Students Stand When Called Upon, and When Not - NYTimes.com