Wikiversity

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Coordination of Wikiversities of all languages is underway at the Beta Wikiversity.

Wikiversity (in English) now exists at http://en.wikiversity.org/ - please help develop the project there!

Image:Wikiversity beta.png

Diese Seite auf Deutsch

Wikiversity is a beta project of the Wikimedia Foundation, located at http://en.wikiversity.org/.

Contents

[edit] Mission

Template:Wikiversity Note: The rest of this page is an historical archive of information about early plans for the Wikiversity project. Follow the link called "Current proposal" to view the Wikiversity project proposal that was approved by the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees.

The purpose of the Wikiversity project, which will ultimately reside at www.wikiversity.org, is to build an electronic institution of learning that will be used to test the limits of the wiki model both for developing electronic learning resources as well as for teaching and for conducting research and publishing results (within a policy framework developed by the community).

The goals can be described as follows:

  • E-teaching materials. The development and cataloging of tests, teaching materials that go beyond the scope of Wikibooks such as slides and videos, complete courses, and more. All this information must be presented from a neutral point of view and represent the current state of scientific research. Wikibooks will be used as a partner project where appropriate.
  • E-learning. A framework within which members of the community can actually take courses online.
  • For more info on what Wikiversity is, please check its About page.

[edit] Vision

Wikiversity could become much more than "yet another university" - it has the potential for rethinking the mode of education itself, or, at least, for furthering the model of collaborative education that is taking hold of the progressive educative community. Collaborative learning (or, variously, "cohort learning", "constructivist learning", or as part of a learning community) is increasingly seen as a key factor in increasing participation and motivation in courses, both off and online. In this model, teachers are facilitators - they set up key elements of activities, courses and programs, but the content and process of these activities etc. is largely dictated by the students themselves; for example, collaboratively writing and researching a business proposal, or producing a poster of the pros and cons of GM technology. We can see collaborative work in any Wikimedia project, particularly the Wikipedias. If this is worked well (and it is all down to groupwork dynamics and constant monitoring by the facilitator), the students will take charge of the activity and it will usually have more meaning for them than something which is learned through the simple description of the field/subject/theory. This touches on the experiential element to education, requiring a reflective element on the behalf of students and teachers, which can be done through keeping a personal diary and sharing this selectively with the teacher or group, or even of writing this openly, for example in the form of a blog (or wiki-blog).

Furthermore, Wikiversity need not be confined to traditional university programs. It could be used for a wide range of literacy programs which could be of use to millions, particularly in the developing world. In a globalising world, major languages like English or Chinese are increasingly desirable - these could be taught through the wikiversity. Similarly, just like other Wikimedia projects, smaller languages could be promoted and taught by the same means. The scope could encompass any range of learning - educative content is shown to be deliverable through electronic means to a wide range of age groups (there is also the inherent potential for different literacies here, particularly computer literacy and media literacy - these need to be factored into any program). Fundamentally though, the scope of a Wikiversity course, whether it is purely research-led or about practical training, or what the age group and/or level of the course should be, should be up to the course teacher/facilitator, and be allowed to grow naturally according to its own need. Therefore the vision of Wikiversity cannot be defined by one person, but, like all wikis, by the participants themselves - including the students.

[edit] Possible software needs

Wikiversity should be possible without changes to our software, MediaWiki. However, the software may need work in the following area:

  • Electronic testing. It could be useful to have the capability to take tests through the wiki.
  • Web of trust. It may be helpful to have some kind of certification model to grade Wikiversity students.
  • Single login. Every new project makes it more difficult to merge the many user accounts from the different Wikimedia projects. It would be desirable to have single login in place before Wikiversity is launched.
  • MediaWiki extensions for various scientific disciplines (see especially WikiTeX, which is currently not installed for security reasons)
  • Templates and guidelines should be provided to authors in order to structure the courses (and "Learning Objects") according to sound pedagogy standards.
"Learning Objects" and "sound pedagogy standards" do not have anything to do with one another --WiseWoman 07:25, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Multiple metadata ( categories, LOM, Dublin Core, whatever) need to be able to be assiged (semi-automatically?) and searched. This could be in an additional tab behind the starting page / launching page for material

[edit] Wikiversity so far

In order to work in an organized way towards full coverage of the topics normally taught at universities, the current School of Wikiversity could be organized into six major divisions,

  1. Physical Sciences,
  2. Life Sciences,
  3. Humanities,
  4. Practical Arts and Sciences
  5. Social Sciences.
  6. Business

Within these six major divisions are 45 schools. For example, the Humanities Division contains schools of Art and Design, Classics, Law, Linguistics, Literature and English Studies, Music, Philosophy and Theology. Within the Wikiversity Social Sciences Division the School of History has an example of an active course called The Great War and Versailles taught by Christopher Polizano.

[edit] Other courses being developed include:

[edit] Example

One example adapted from the German Wikiversität has been started in English as an experimentation area, subject to disappearing at any time.

[edit] FAQ

Q: Does Wikiversity compete with Wikibooks?

No, the goals of Wikiversity are to develop materials that would be inappropriate on Wikibooks, to index Wikimedia resources, to index existing resources by other institutions, and to actively use these materials for teaching, autonomous learning, and research. Wikibooks would be useful to relevant Wikiversity courses as texts.
Alternate answer - Yes, Wikiversity would compete with Wikibooks, and its material would be similar to Wikibooks material. (Essay at No to Wikiversity)

Q: What will be the relation between Wikiversity and the Research Team?

There has been some discussion of the role of research in Wikiversity (scattered among various pages here at Meta, Wikibooks and at other websites. It will be natural for Wikiversity to provide support for any research project that is relevant to Wikimedia projects. (see The role of research, Moving Wikiversity forward, Wikiversity Core Courses Initiative)

Q: What is the current status of the project? When will it start?

Wikiversity proposal modifications requested by the Board.

[edit] Presentation

A presentation of Wikiversity was done by Anthere in september 2005 in Pretoria. See the Presentation of WMF and Wikiversity and the report Conference reports/FLOSS, South Africa 2005/Workshop 2.

[edit] Vote

The result of the vote (at 00:00 (UTC) 2005-11-01) was 199 votes in favor (69.8%), 86 votes against.

[edit] Resources

[edit] Links

  • Meta Collab, a Wiki about collaboration, has a long article about the Wikiversity!
Retrieved from "http://wiki.eugeneneighbors.org/wiki/Wikiversity"
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