User Generated Content And School

David Kirkpatrick started out his weekly column two weeks ago with this:

At my daughter's New York City high school her teachers tell her to not to use Wikipedia.

David and I both live in lower manhattan and our kids go to similar, but not the same, schools. I sent David a private email telling him that I have advised my kids to turn a deaf ear to such instructions when it comes to Wikipedia.

I want my kids to include the web in their learning experience. They know that Wikipedia is "peer produced". They know they can't trust everything they read there. They also know they can't trust everything they read anywhere, especially so called "trusted sources" like the New York Times.

Jessica is in high school. It's getting harder and harder for me to help her when she doesn't understand something in math or science. So we use Wikipedia all the time, to find a formula or an example that will remind me of something I learned 30 years ago and that will help her visualize the issue in her own mind. We also consult her class notes, her textbook, and anything else that might help. But let me tell you, the Internet is the best source there is for a parent trying to help their kid learn something complicated.

This was proven to me again this week. Jessica is studying electromagnetics and superconductivity. She has a presentation on this topic today at school. She built an elecromagnet and wanted to explain how super cooled superconductors behave differently. We didn't have the right metal or access to liquid nitrogen. But we have YouTube. And that is all it took to amaze her, educate her, and delight her. And me too.

[there is no audio in this 1:42 min video]

Comments (20) | Posted March 9, 2007 in Venture Capital and Technology

Comments

absolutely - and not just for kids - what luddite advice from the school, that's very poor.

my wife is a mature student and in her final year, in the midst of her dissertation - the internet has been invaluable to her studies: not to plagarise works but for sources of research, links, references, ideas, etc - if there is any doubt regards any wikipedia article it typically references several accredited links at the end of each article, anyway - and if one is doing formal research one can only reference accredited sources anyway.

Posted by: carl rahn griffith | Mar 9, 2007 7:08:58 AM

Here's the thing about Wikipedia and education...

If you teach your children to be critical thinkers, then there is absolutely no problem with involving wikipedia in the educational process.

If your kids do not understand that some sources have more authority than others. If your kids do not understand that sometimes information sources come with an agenda.

Sadly, I think many kids don't understand these things.

My girls are 5 and 2.5, I haven't needed to worry about this yet. I think the first thing I will teach them about wikipedia is how it is created. We'll find something they're interested in. We'll do some original source research on that subject together, and we'll either make a new page or make a page better.

Maybe it's just me, but I think sceptisicm is a hugely important part of education.

Posted by: Erik Schwartz | Mar 9, 2007 7:56:52 AM

My kids love Wikipedia. My 10 year old daughter got our IP banned from Wikipedia for a week for totally hosing a page she was trying to edit. Apparently there was some incorrect information about her favorite horse breed and she tried to "fix it. I've asked her daughter to refrain from editing for now, at least until I can provide a lesson on the editing rules at Wikipedia.

Posted by: COD | Mar 9, 2007 8:04:01 AM

you always know the the kids are onto something awesome when the grown ups come out of the woodwork railing against it...

Posted by: Phil | Mar 9, 2007 9:03:09 AM

Even when studying physics at university, I've used Wikipedia a lot. In fact, there have been several accounts when Wikipedia had an explanation on a subject of advanced physics like solid state or quantum mechanics that was clearer and more concise than the textbook I was supposed to use by my professors. It may not substitute for these books, but certainly helps one get a broader look at the matter.

Posted by: Rik | Mar 9, 2007 9:08:17 AM

Thanks for posting this immensely cool video. It's even better if the end synchronizes with the end of Black Wave / Bad Vibrations from Neon Bible playing on Rhapsody, although I didn't plan it that way.

Posted by: Andrew | Mar 9, 2007 11:27:18 AM

While I use wikipedia almost daily, I think you may be misrepresenting what the teacher really meant.

There has been quite a bit of media attention on this lately, and its not that teachers don't want students to use wikipedia as a place to get ideas/inspiration/reference, they just don't want students to use wikipedia as a source of fact in their work.

The video is great, but I'm sure your daughter didn't go to school and tell everyone that magnets behave differently when supercooled, and here is a video found on youtube originating from filecabi.net to prove it.

Sources of fact should be an authority, and I hardly consider Wikipedia an authority on any subject.

Posted by: Dan | Mar 9, 2007 11:48:55 AM

I agree with you but you overstate the case when you (at least appear to) conflate Wikipedia with "the Internet." Of course a school (or anyone) can be highly skeptical (to oddly borrow Erik's word) of Wikipedia but be highly supportive of students using "the Internet."

Also, can't we avoid the knee-jerk anti-authoritarian stuff? Debating the worthiness of Wikipedia is not automatically a defense of anything else, whether "old media" versus new, or the New York Times or (for heaven's sake) "grown ups" versus "kids." Sheesh. Pass the bong, will ya?

Posted by: Grand Egress | Mar 9, 2007 12:52:01 PM

Wikipedia is a disruptive technology. Teachers are hardly a tech forward group. Those averse to change will always try to hold the door shut so we can continue doing things the old way. Five years from now Wikipedia won't be the least bit controversial. Fortunately, we'll have newer disruptive technologies to discuss.

Posted by: Mitch Rubin | Mar 9, 2007 1:04:28 PM

The power of the internet is terrific for motivated students. I was talking to a class at the local business school and the professor clued me into what happens on a regular basis. The kids sit in class w/ their laptops connected to the internet. The take notes, IM, etc, but they also google what the prof is discussing. They will ask questions based on their google results (like wikipedia) during class, and often these questions challenge the profs position. The prof needs to be ready for this, and up to date. Maybe the teachers suggesting wikipedia should not be used are worried about being challenged by critical thinkers!

Posted by: Bob Sargent | Mar 9, 2007 1:19:46 PM

What? Wikipedia rocks!

Posted by: TheBillfold | Mar 9, 2007 1:30:37 PM

My daughter is a sophomore in a rural NC high school and has been told the same by many of her teachers. She was told to use the textbook issued by the school as a "reliable, trusted" source since its been "reviewed by professionals." When I confronted several of the teachers with corrections from the publishers to the textbooks in use (sometimes pages and pages of corrections) I was met with a "deer in the headlight, eyes glazed over, mouth agape" expression before they quickly changed the subject.

I've been careful to explain to her and her friends where the content of Wikipedia comes from and that what they read/discover there needs to be collaborated and verified by other sources.

Is Wikipedia or any user generated content error free? Of course not. But, neither is the published textbooks that are being offered up as "reliable and trusted" sources by her teachers.

Posted by: Rich Harrison | Mar 9, 2007 1:50:32 PM

If I had access to liquid nitrogen in high school, my experience would have been much better.

Posted by: Jeffrey McManus | Mar 9, 2007 2:05:52 PM

Wikipedia definitely has its place in education. However it's also worth remembering that, at least in my experience as a writer and editor, it is flat our wrong when it comes to information on history and literature to a much, much greater extent then most standard published materials.

Wikipedia should be an essential part of a student's web usage, but, like anything, you can never rely on one source, regardless of how it is created. This is especially true for things that are a bit more off the beaten path.

Posted by: Ted | Mar 9, 2007 2:51:03 PM

I did have (illicit) access to liquid nitrogen in high school and it almost got me expelled.

If you shatter a LN2 frozen, dead lab rat, it's really gross when it thaws. (it wasn't my idea)

Posted by: Erik Schwartz | Mar 9, 2007 3:39:22 PM

I'm sure there's some Luddism involved in the opposition to Wikipedia, but I also recall being discouraged from using the Encyclopedia when I was in school. We were encouraged to find primary sources. As Carl suggests above, using Wikipedia to find primary, or primary-ish, sources is perfectly valid (not to mention unenforceable). Using Wikipedia as an all-purpose crutch essentially amounts to outsourcing your brain.

Posted by: michael hirschorn | Mar 9, 2007 6:58:45 PM

It appears to me that sometimes people forget that not every book, every teacher, every so called expert is a good source for high quality information just because someone gave them the "authority label". Wikipedia isn´t perfect - nothing is! But Wikipedia rocks - and that´s quite unique in education.

Posted by: Steli Efti | Mar 9, 2007 9:28:22 PM

Thanks Fred, I learned something to from watching that video :) It's never too late to get edumacated :)

Posted by: P-Air | Mar 10, 2007 12:11:20 PM

Fred, good post and, as usual, many insightful comments. The discussion raises a related question which is “what learning skills do children require in today’s environment, one in which a great deal of data and information are available to them, and are our schools teaching these skills?” In other words, are the standard approaches of memorization and practicing spelling or multiplication tables still worthwhile? I believe that when so much information is accessible, the skill of refined searching – that is, “this information is sort of what I am looking for, but not exactly it. Let me modify my query a bit to see if I can get better results” is critical, as is critical thinking and evaluation of the data that is retrieved – which brings us back to Wikipedia. How do we teach kids how to do these things or, on a more scalable level, get school curricula updated?

Posted by: Rich | Mar 10, 2007 1:44:51 PM

I find that absolutely amazing.

You would think they would encourage using outside sources. After all it happens all the time in the real world

Posted by: Jim Eiden | Mar 10, 2007 4:03:15 PM

A VC

Musings of a VC in NYC