User talk:Cnobis

UNBLOCK REQUEST MATERIALSCIENTIST
Hoping to get our IP address unblocked.

I am a middle school teacher working with students on a long term research project. The project is an attempt to show students a real world application for their research, and to get students engaged in an online community of learners interested in the same topics they are.

We are currently working on a school based project where students are working to edit wikipedia based upon their research of a variety of topics. These topics are wide ranging and are guided thematically based upon the National History Day theme for this year. Students are supervised in the classroom and encouraged to make appropriate edits on their pages. I understand that one student this afternoon was blocked as a result of "vandalism". This student was excited to be editing information on his topic, though I do know that it was redundant and overly biased. This is something we have discussed and hopefully rectified. The block (and subsequent blocks) do impact the other 65 students in the class. Many students were mid-edit when the block was issued and could not complete their edits as a result. I am hoping there is something that can be done so that the final two days we work on this in class this is not an issue. We will be working on 2/29/16 and 3/3/16.

Thanks

20:27, 23 February 2016 (UTC)cnobis

I'd say that you're definitely misrepresenting the block. It's not just because it was "redundant and overly biased" material. It's also because of edits like this, this, and this which are clearly inappropriate. only (talk) 20:56, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

I'm not trying to misrepresent the individual user block. Please, keep him blocked. It's a good lesson on the importance of using appropriate means of getting your point across. But what can I do to ensure that we can continue the remained of the project with out having the entire school locked out all at once?

This will be addressed internally with the student. At the same time, I believe it is important to get students to understand how to be good digital citizens in a growing digital world. Please let me know what I can do going forward.

22:59, 23 February 2016 (UTC) cnobis
 * I don't have much confidence that your students have received adequate instruction as how to particate in Wikipedia, given their age and the contributions I've seen so far. Please carefully read Student_assignments and School and university projects. Furthermore, you don't understand how to sign your own posts and you managed to bungle this attempt to make another unblock request. OhNo itsJamie Talk 23:08, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Other problematic edits I've found from your students:
 * Creating a Disney Timeline (that I've deleted)
 * Changing the spelling so that it doesn't match with the title
 * Introducing spelling errors
 * Trite prose that adds nothing of value to the article
 * Using a dubious cartoon Youtube as a source
 * Adding excessive detail to the lede paragraph
 * Adding clumsy trivia to articles
 * Adding inappropriate WP:POV analysis to articles
 * That's just a few that I've found. OhNo itsJamie Talk 23:26, 23 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Just curious, but how many edits are taken down daily from wikipedia?

Cnobis (talk) 23:34, 23 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Also, thanks for the heads up on the bungled attempt at posting about the unblock. Wasn't quite clear on that. Thanks for the help. Look forward to continuing some type of engagement. Perhaps you wouldn't mind pointing me towards something that could be helpful for middle school students? Most of the materials created for students and to assist students are geared towards college students. I would like to think that there is a younger age that students could participate online than high school and college. Cnobis (talk) 23:52, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Maybe Simple Wikipedia would be a better place to start? Part of the problem with contributing here is that many of the subjects the typical middle schooler would be learning about are adequately covered here (i.e., the articles are mature), and as such, when students are looking for content to add to them, it has a good chance of being redundant (as we saw with the additions to the Gustave Eiffel article.  Simple Wikipedia is not as "mature" of a project as Wikipedia is for many topics. OhNo itsJamie  Talk 00:20, 24 February 2016 (UTC)