Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Vanderbilt University/African Politics (Spring 2022)

This course introduces students to key topics in African Politics. Students have a &quot;term project&quot; to individually improve wikipedia regarding African politics topics in their assigned African country.

Week 1
This week, everyone should have a Wikipedia account.  (Because of Wikipedia's technical restraints, you may receive a message that you cannot create an account. To resolve this, please try again off campus or the next day.)

Welcome to your Wikipedia assignment's course timeline. This page guides you through the steps you'll need to complete for your Wikipedia assignment, with links to training modules and your classmates' work spaces.

Your course has been assigned a Wikipedia Expert. You can reach them through the Get Help button at the top of this page.

Resources:


 * Editing Wikipedia, pages 1–5
 * Evaluating Wikipedia

What types of pages exist regarding African politics in a few countries you are interested in? One way to think about this is to examine what pages exists for on politics in prominent countries in the Global North, where pages are more developed and compare to your country/countries of interest. It might be helpful to have a few ideas in mind for the library session, so you can follow along the librarian with some of those topics to see if resources exist.

Week 2
Biographies

History

Political Science

Women's Studies

Exercise
Evaluate an article

Exercise
Choose a topic

Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 6

Week 4
For each idea, list at least 4 scholarly resources that you could use to create your page; also list why it is important to do the topic for the country, and why it is a good topic based on building on your personal interests. Instructors will give you individual feedback to help you settle on a topic.

Exercise
Add a citation

What's a content gap?

Week 5
Finalize your topic / Find your sources

Week 6
Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have questions using the Get Help button at the top of this page.

Resource: Editing Wikipedia, pages 7–9

Everyone has begun writing their article drafts.

Thinking about sources and plagiarism

Week 8
Now that you've improved your draft based on others' feedback, it's time to move your work live - to the &quot;mainspace.&quot;

Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 13

Exercise
Add links to your article

Now's the time to revisit your text and refine your work. You may do more research and find missing information; rewrite the lead section to represent all major points; reorganize the text to communicate the information better; or add images and other media.

Guiding framework

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

Week 10
Thinking about Wikipedia

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
You probably have some feedback from other students and possibly other Wikipedians. Consider their suggestions, decide whether it makes your work more accurate and complete, and edit your draft to make those changes.

Resources:


 * Editing Wikipedia, pages 12 and 14
 * Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have any questions.

Make sure to have a great (finalized? almost finalized?) draft article ready for your presentations.


 * 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 the class Wikipedia Expert from Wikiedu at any time!

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 12
Guiding questions

Guiding questions

Week 16
Everyone should have finished all of the work they'll do on Wikipedia, and be ready for grading.