As some of you might guess, I get mixed reactions whenever I reveal that I use Wikipedia in my history classes. And not just for reading; I actually assign my students to research and write an article for Wikipedia. And it has consistently been one of my most successful assignments. It shows students the difference between fact-only writing and analytical writing, it provides an introduction to research methods, and it gives them more insight into the working of Wikipedia, so they understand why they should or shouldn’t use it for various circumstances.
Part One: Figure Out What You’re Building
Seems simple enough, but I can’t begin to count the number of times that failing to do this caused a project to spiral out of control without direction. Meeting with project managers and content creators about what exactly we’re building, what kind of site we’re creating, is of the utmost importance at the beginning of a project.