Blame Game

There are many legitimate concerns about Wikipedia. There are also, however, many problems that are easy to blame on Wikipedia (or the resource at hand, but more often then not Wikipedia), but which are actually issues with our reference services. Jody mentioned a few of these when discussing her concerns with how she has seen Wikipedia used in the classroom as a TOC in her posting on July 3.

The first of these was when she said “I do not feel comfortable allowing it to be a starting point for my students’ research when most of them have not been taught the information literacy skills required to verify the information.” While the concern is very valid, I disagreed with the implication that this is a problem with using Wikipedia. The problem here is that students have not been taught the appropriate information literacy skills, something that is required for all research in all resources. Wikipedia does require a different technical skill set than print encyclopedias, but the lack of this in the program does not make Wikipedia a lesser resource. The fact that “Most of the time students turn towards Wikipedia as their first and sometimes only source of information” is a problem with library services and information literacy education, not Wikipedia. I responded applying this concern to the use of other research materials: “I am not comfortable having students use print encyclopedias or newspapers or textbooks either without the information literacy skills required to critically evaluate the information they are receiving. In fact, they should be taught these skills before being asked to apply them by being given a research assignment.”

The second was referring to the ease of plagiarism when using Wikipedia, something often mentioned when teachers have problems with how they students are doing their research. Perhaps it is faster to cut and copy from Wikipedia than to copy out a print encyclopedia, but conventional encyclopedias online have the same drawback. Realistically, if a student is going to plagiarise (either innocently because they have not been taught not to, or despite being taught not to), they will manage just fine out of any resource. It is unreasonable to list this as a drawback of Wikipedia.

Many of us find it difficult to trust Wikipedia for a variety of legitimate reasons. However, we need to be sure to separate this from things that students who are not information literate do wrong while using Wikipedia. Not doing so weakens the important concerns and issues that need addressing when using Wikipedia in the classroom.