[Olpc-open] A Wikipedia for Children.

[Sven AERTS]

OMG that Simple English portal page of the wikipedia has a dedicated page
for schools/teachers/kids.  Barry, I think this is what you've been looking
for:
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Schools

!

On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 11:26 AM, Sven AERTS <svenaerts228 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Barry, hi Samuel,
>
> Quiz: On the wikipedia, in the navigation pane on the left, under the
> section "Languages" , there is a "language" / category mentioned that is
> not a language and intended for a specific public. What is the name of that
> "language"?
>
> "Languages"
>
>    - Simple English <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/>
>
>
> The *Simple English Wikipedia* is a Wikipedia
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia> encyclopedia
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopedia>, written in basic English
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_English>.[1]
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_English_Wikipedia#cite_note-1>
>
> Articles in the Simple English Wikipedia use shorter sentences and simpler
> words <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words> and grammar
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammar> than the English Wikipedia
> <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Wikipedia>.
>
> The Simple English Wikipedia is also for people with different needs. Some
> examples of people who use Simple English Wikipedia:
>
>    - Students <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student>
>    - Children <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children>
>    - Adults <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adult> who might find it
>    hard to learn or read
>    - People who are learning English
>    <https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language>
>
> Other people use the Simple English Wikipedia because the simple language
> helps them understand hard ideas or topics they do not know about.
> Right now, the Simple English Wikipedia has 117,857 articles. As of
> October 2015, it was the 49th largest Wikipedia
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 3:32 AM, Samuel Klein <sj at laptop.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi Barry, this looks like an excellent candidate to merge with Vikidia.
>> Have you worked with them or their community of children and teachers?
>>
>> https://en.vikidia.org/wiki/Main_Page
>>
>> Warmly, SJ
>>
>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:10 AM, Barry Desborough <
>> barry.desborough at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hello, I’m Barry Desborough, a retired teacher who taught in English
>>> primary and secondary schools.
>>>
>>> I have been trying, on and off, to get an idea off the ground. It is for
>>> a free, online, child-oriented encyclopedia. I have tried approaching
>>> Wikipedia itself, the Khan Academy and the California CK-12 initiative, and
>>> I have paid for and started to develop a  Wikispaces site "Wikidia dot net"
>>> to show how the idea works. Unfortunately, I was not able to rustle up
>>> enough contributors to be able to justify continuing to pay for the site,
>>> and for various reasons, the other sites are not a good match for the
>>> project idea.
>>>
>>> What’s a child-oriented encyclopedia? It’s an encyclopedia that a child,
>>> on their own, may go to and navigate for themselves, to find
>>> age-appropriate educational content of interest to them. Pages should be
>>> brief, and as simple as possible for conveying the information. The pages
>>> should also be suitable for directed learners, and usable as teaching
>>> material by educators. Wikipedia content, as is used by the OLPC Digital
>>> Library, is not generated with the needs of children in mind. I have an old
>>> prototype of the idea still on the net at
>>> https://wikids.wikispaces.com/Index+1 which should give the general
>>> idea.
>>>
>>> I am looking for a new home for this project, and it occurred to me that
>>> the OLPC might be able to host it, and encourage other contributions of
>>> suitable content, either from educators, or from children themselves,
>>> wiki-style. Generating content for it should provide a great motivational
>>> incentive for classes of pupils! There’s constructivism for you! All it
>>> would need would be a separate searchable wiki on the OLPC website. I would
>>> be happy to spend the rest of my retirement generating, curating and
>>> moderating content for such a wiki, and I would be willing to contribute a
>>> substantial (for me) sum in order to help get the thing started and keep it
>>> going.
>>>
>>> With the cost and producing and distributing textbooks is so high, and
>>> in a world where teachers are unavailable or too expensive but cheap
>>> internet technology is becoming ever more accessible, I believe far more
>>> attention should be paid to providing accessible, high quality,
>>> appropriately pitched educational content.
>>>
>>> Is there anyone on the list with the authority to pick this up, or has
>>> contacts with such people?
>>>
>>> What are your thoughts on the idea?
>>>
>>> Regards
>>>
>>> Barry
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Olpc-open mailing list
>>> Olpc-open at lists.laptop.org
>>> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Samuel Klein          @metasj          w:user:sj          +1 617 529 4266
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Olpc-open mailing list
>> Olpc-open at lists.laptop.org
>> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open
>>
>>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.laptop.org/pipermail/olpc-open/attachments/20160313/a6b00c69/attachment.html>