I really cant stand how people misconstrue Wikipedia. People often seem to be under the impression that its a cesspool of misinformation. This is partially the fault of it advertising itself as a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Admittedly, anyone being able to edit a page is easy bait for people who want to spread lies. The thing is, though, that the site has measures put in place to ensure that the information is as factual as possible. Admins and attentive users can easily look at a pages history to revert any false changes. Most of the false edits are made on articles about media and pop culture; I have yet to see false information on an article with an actual scientific subject (Who would want to edit the amount of ATP created from a glucose molecule, for instance?). Furthermore, there are citations. Those blue numbers that appear all over the place arent just for show; they are links to sources of information. They show where information comes from and, perhaps more importantly, that the information came from another place at all and not just someones imagination. This way, information can easily be verified or discredited. Additionally, [citation needed] tags are added to information that should be taken with caution since it has yet to be verified. If a student is to write a research paper, Wikipedia is a very convenient hub for actual sources and can make the research much more efficient. Obviously, Wikipedia is not to be cited as a source itself, but the citations within a Wikipedia article can be. This is a distinction that students could easily be taught. However, as a result of teachers who dont understand how this works, Wikipedia has been blocked from schools including my own. In addition to the internet as a whole, rather than teaching students how to properly use an excellent, efficient resource, instructors choose to ban it outright so as to not have to enact the labor of learning it themselves, which really is a shame.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 23:33:31 +0000