Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Carnegie Mellon University/Communication in Groups and Organizations, Fall 2017 (Fasll)

Most of management is communication. You communicate to get information that will be the basis of decisions, coordinate activity, to provide a vision for the people who work for and with you, and to sell yourself and your work. The goal of this course is to identify communication challenges within work groups and organizations and ways to overcome them. To do this requires that we know how communication normally works, what parts are difficult, and how to fix it when it goes wrong.

The focus of this course is on providing you with a broad understanding of the way communication operates within dyads, work groups, and organizations. The intent is to give you theoretical and empirical underpinnings for the communication you will undoubtedly participate in when you move to a work environment, and strategies for improving communication within your groups. Because technology is changing communication patterns and outcomes both in organizations and more broadly in society, the course examines these technological changes as well. Readings come primarily from the empirical research literature supplemented with case studies and exercises.

Course syllabus is at http://orgcom17.hciresearch.org/content/syllabus.

Week 1
Welcome to your Wikipedia project's course timeline. This page will guide you through the Wikipedia project for your course. Be sure to check with your instructor to see if there are other pages you should be following as well.

This page breaks down writing a Wikipedia article into a series of steps, or milestones. These steps include online trainings to help you get started on Wikipedia.

Your course has also been assigned a Wikipedia Expert. Check your Talk page for notes from them. You can also reach them through the &quot;Get Help&quot; button on this page.

To get started, please review the following handouts:


 * Editing Wikipedia pages 1–5
 * Evaluating Wikipedia


 * Create an account and join this course page, using the enrollment link your instructor sent you. (To avoid hitting Wikipedia's account creation limits, this is best done outside of class. Only 6 new accounts may be created per day from the same IP address.)
 * It's time to dive into Wikipedia. Below, you'll find the first set of online trainings you'll need to take. New modules will appear on this timeline as you get to new milestones. Be sure to check back and complete them! Incomplete trainings will be reflected in your grade.
 * When you finish the trainings, practice by introducing yourself to a classmate on that classmate’s Talk page.
 * Read : Editing Wikipedia pages1-6.

This week, everyone should have a Wikipedia account and user page with some content.

Week 2
Intertwine is a platform where you you will be chatting with student editors enrolled in other Wiki Education courses. This week, the featured activity includes


 * Creating your own User page
 * Learning about user Talk pages and writing on others' Talk pages
 * Getting to know more Wikipedia editors and learning from each other's experiences

Sign up for a session here. After logging in using your Wikipedia credentials, you will be able to sign up for our activity.

It's time to think critically about Wikipedia articles. You'll evaluate a Wikipedia article of your choosing, based on some of the questions below. In a later session you will jointly discuss how a different article could be improved with students from other courses.


 * Complete the &quot;Evaluating Articles and Sources&quot; training (linked below).
 * Select an article that on a topic where you are knowledgeable.  As you read, consider the following questions (but don't feel limited to these):
 * Create a section in your sandbox titled &quot;Article evaluation&quot; and leave your notes about your observations and learnings there.


 * 1) Does the article lead (aka lede) provide a clear overview of the main article content?
 * 2) Is everything in the article relevant to the article topic? Is there anything that distracted you?
 * 3) Is the article neutral? Are there any claims, or frames, that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * 4) Are there viewpoints that are over-represented, or under-represented?
 * 5) Is each fact referenced with an appropriate, reliable reference? Where does the information come from? Are these neutral sources? If biased, is that bias noted?
 * 6) Is any information out of date? Is anything missing that could be added?
 * 7) Check a few citations. Do the links work? Does the source support the claims in the article?
 * 8)  Check out the Talk page of the article. What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * 9) How is the article rated? Here is a link to a tool that shows the automatically-assessed quality of a Wikipedia article revision:  http://128.2.204.76:8000/ArticleQuality
 * 10) How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Week 3
Familiarize yourself with editing Wikipedia by adding a citation to an article. There are two ways you can do this:


 * Add 1-2 sentences to a course-related article, backed up with a citation to an appropriate source. There are two ways to do this -- either start with a scientific article and add the citation to a relevant Wikipedia article or start with a Wikipedia article and then find a relevant citation in the scientific literature
 * Starting with a scientific article: Look through articles from Current Directions in Psychological Science or a similar reference source for interesting articles relevant to the course published in the last 5-7 years. Add one idea or fact from this research to a relevant article in Wikipedia, preferably one on which you'd want to work. Be sure to include an inline citation to the original source. One way to find a Wikipedia article for this new information is to identify some keywords from the title or abstract of the Current Directions' article and conduct an advanced Google search of the form keywords site:Wikipedia.org,, which will restrict the search to the wikipedia.org domain. For example, a Google search on &quot;person perception thin slices site:wikipedia.org&quot; returns articles on &quot;interpersonal perception&quot;, &quot;Blink (book)&quot; &quot;Nalini Ambady&quot; and &quot;Thin-slicing&quot;, all of which are relevant to this topic.
 * Starting with a Wikipedia article: Alternatively, you could identify a Wikipedia article and then conduct a Google scholar or Psych Info search on that topic to find relevant scholarly articles. For example, to find relevant, recent scholarly articles relevant to the Wikipedia article on thin slicing, you could conduct a Google Scholar search, with the key words &quot;person perception&quot; and &quot;thin slice&quot; and a custom date range from 2008-2017.   The Citation Hunt tool shows unreferenced statements from articles. First, evaluate whether the statement in question is true! An uncited statement could just be lacking a reference or it could be inaccurate or misleading. Reliable sources on the subject will help you choose whether to add it or correct the statement.

Week 4

 * Make sure everyone in the group is assigned to the same Wikipedia article on the Students tab of this course page.
 * Select one group member whose Sandbox space you'll all share to draft your article. Each person should link to that shared Sandbox from their own Sandbox page. A sandbox is like any other page on Wikipedia, and anyone can edit it.
 * Wikipedia doesn't allow multiple people to edit from different devices at the same time. If you're working together in person, one person should add the work to the Sandbox. If you are all working independently, make small edits and save often to avoid &quot;editing conflicts&quot; with classmates. Make sure that you're logged in under your own Wikipedia account while editing in your classmate's sandbox to ensure your edits are recorded.
 * Don't create a group account for your project. Group accounts are prohibited.


 * Review page 6 of your Editing Wikipedia guidebook.
 * Look up 3-5 potential topics related to the course that you might want to update on Wikipedia. Review the content of the article and check the Talk page to see what other Wikipedians are already contributing. Identify one or two areas from each that you could improve.
 * Choose 2-3 potential articles from that list that you can tackle, and post links to the articles and your notes about what you might improve in to this course forum.

Week 5

 * On the Students tab, assign your chosen topic to yourself.
 * In your sandbox, write a few sentences about what you plan to contribute to the selected article.
 * Think back to when you did an article critique. What can you add? Post some of your ideas to the article's talk page, too.
 * Compile a list of relevant, reliable books, journal articles, or other sources. Post that bibliography to the talk page of the article you'll be working on, and in your sandbox. Make sure to check in on the Talk page to see if anyone has advice on your bibliography.
 * Compile a bibliography of relevant, reliable sources and post it to the sandbox you are working with. Begin reading the sources. It helps to write brief summaries of the articles you have read on the sandbox, so that you won't forget the important content as you read more. Make sure to check in on the talk page (or watchlist) to see if anyone has advice on your bibliography.
 * If you are improving an existing article, create a detailed outline reflecting your proposed changes, and post this outline along with a brief description of your plans, on the article’s talk page for community feedback. Make sure to check back on the talk page often and engage with any responses.
 * If you are starting a new article, write a 3–4 paragraph summary version of your article—with citations—in your Wikipedia sandbox.

Intertwine is a platform where you you will be chatting with student editors enrolled in other Wiki Education courses. This week, the featured activities include:


 * Learning Wikipedia’s five pillars as evaluation criteria
 * Evaluating an existing Wikipedia article with your peers
 * Getting to know more Wikipedia editors and learning from each other's experiences

Sign up for a session here. If you haven’t logged in using your Wikipedia account, you will first be redirected to Wikipedia logging page. After logging in using your Wikipedia credentials, you will be able to sign up for our activity.

Week 6
You've picked a topic and found your sources. Now it's time to start writing.

Creating a new article?


 * Write an outline of that topic in the form of a standard Wikipedia article's &quot;lead section.&quot; Write it in your sandbox.
 * A &quot;lead&quot; section is not a traditional introduction. It should summarize, very briefly, what the rest of the article will say in detail. The first paragraph should include important, broad facts about the subject. A good example is Ada Lovelace. See Editing Wikipedia page 9 for more ideas.

Improving an existing article?


 * Identify what's missing from the current form of the article. Think back to the skills you learned while critiquing an article. Make notes for improvement in your sandbox.

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Keep reading your sources, too, as you prepare to write the body of the article.

Resources: Editing Wikipedia pages 7–9

Everyone has begun writing their article drafts.

You should have had your advisor meeting with Professor Kraut by 10/13.

Week 7

 * Keep working on transforming your article into a complete first draft. Get draft ready for peer-review.
 * If you'd like a Wikipedia Expert to review your draft, now is the time! Click the &quot;Get Help&quot; button in your sandbox to request notes.


 * First, take the &quot;Peer Review&quot; online training.
 * Select two classmates’ articles that you will peer review and copyedit. On the Articles tab, find the articles that you want to review.  Since we want each article to be peer reviewed by three or four students in the class, indicate which articles you will review by filling in this spreadsheet. Then in the &quot;My Articles&quot; section of the Home tab, also assign them to yourself to review.
 * Peer review your classmates' drafts. Leave suggestions on on the Talk pages of the articles, or sandboxes, that your fellow student are working on. Other editors may be reviewing your work, so look for their comments! Be sure to acknowledge feedback from other Wikipedians.
 * As you review, make spelling, grammar, and other adjustments. Pay attention to the tone of the article. Is it encyclopedic?

Every student has finished reviewing their assigned articles, making sure that every article has been reviewed.

Week 8
You probably have some feedback from other students and possibly other Wikipedians. It's time to work with that feedback to improve your article!


 * Read Editing Wikipedia pages 12 and 14.
 * Return to your draft or article and think about the suggestions. Decide which ones to start implementing. Reach out to your instructor or your Wikipedia Expert if you have any questions.

Once you've made improvements to your article based on peer review feedback, it's time to move your work to Wikipedia proper - the &quot;mainspace.&quot;

Editing an existing article?


 * NEVER copy and paste your draft of an article over the entire article. Instead, edit small sections at a time.
 * Copy your edits into the article. Make many small edits, saving each time, and leaving an edit summary. Never replace more than one to two sentences without saving!
 * Be sure to copy text from your sandbox while the sandbox page is in 'Edit' mode. This ensures that the formatting is transferred correctly.

Creating a new article?


 * Read Editing Wikipedia page 13, and follow those steps to move your article from your Sandbox to Mainspace.
 * You can also review the Sandboxes and Mainspace online training.

Week 9
Do additional research and writing to make further improvements to your article, based on suggestions and your own critique.


 * Read Editing Wikipedia page 12 to see how to create links from your article to others, and from other articles to your own. Try to link to 3–5 articles, and link to your article from 2–3 other articles.
 * Consider adding an image to your article. Wikipedia has strict rules about what media can be added, so make sure to take Contributing Images and Media Files training before you upload an image.

Week 10
Intertwine is a platform where you you will be chatting with student editors enrolled in other Wiki Education courses. This week, the featured activity includes


 * Sharing the Wikipedia article your drafted with your peers.
 * Getting feedbacks from your peers on how to make your Wikipedia article even better
 * Providing feedbacks to your peers and help them improve their article

Get started from here! After logging in using your Wikipedia credentials, you will be able to sign up for our activity.

Continue to expand and improve your work, and format your article to match Wikipedia's tone and standards. Remember to contact your Wikipedia Expert at any time if you need further help!

Week 11
It's the final week to develop your article.


 * Read Editing Wikipedia page 15 to review a final check-list before completing your assignment.
 * Don't forget that you can ask for help from your Wikipedia Expert at any time!

Week 12
Everyone should have finished all of the work they'll do on Wikipedia, and be ready for grading.

Week 14
Write a reflective essay (2–5 pages) on your Wikipedia contributions.


 * Write and turn in a reflective essay  (5-10 pages) on your Wikipedia contributions. The essay should have two components. Each team will submit a single reflective essay.
 * The first section should describe and document what you actually did for the assignment and provide a rationale for your changes. Here you should include a URL to the article you worked on and provide an overview of the work you did.  What were your improvement goals. Why these goals?. What types of contributions did you make?  How did you reorganize the page, if you did.  What areas in the article did you expand?  What new material did you add?  What is your assessment of the extent of the improvements you made -- e.g., small updates or corrections ,  adding new section, major reorganization, etc.
 * The second section should describe what you learned about how an online community operates by participating in the assignment.  What kind of interaction did you have with the Wikipedia infrastructure (e.g., policies and guidelines) or with members of the community? What does Wikipedia do to make it easy or hard for newcomers to participate?  How could Wikipedia more effectively take advantage of motivated volunteers like you?