Talk:Wikikids

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Talk:Wikikids/2005 - 2009 (no talks in 2010-2012)

Suggestion for next steps

http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AWikikids&diff=5237449&oldid=2004834

Hello, if you are still thinking about this proposal:

• Get some input from people involved in Vikidia-es and -it, wikikids.nl, and the Grundschulwiki. It would be hard to use the proposed name if the existing Dutch group didn't want to join.

• Describe a potential schedule for a migration to WMF hosting (and any merging of related sites: would they have interlanguage links?). Identify a technical contact. See the history of the Wikivoyage page and the OmegaWiki page for examples. –SJ talk  20:55, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

For children or by children?

Hello, folks! I've read this page and it sounds very reasonable: adults must help to ensure the quality of the content, but allowing kids to write as well is essential for their educational process.

So, my proposal comes from NationStates, an online videogame where players govern their countries. They have school subsites, where students of a specific school or class play their game in a closed environment. This helps the teacher to have better control of what happens.

Of course I don;t propose to close things, Wikimedia projects must be open. But in my view, it would be interesting to give professors a space where they can carry their activities without interference from others. It's more or less like Wikipedia in Education subsites (which I only guess what they are). So, once the students learn enough, the professor can encourage them to contribute to the main site.

Good luck with the project! --NaBUru38 (talk) 16:16, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks !

There is an mw:Extension:Education Program, but I don't know it well...

I would say that we first care of the wiki's community life, and that the work done by a school is often quite separate from the regular users, because each pupil (sadly) most commonly come for a single work. I think that we should share practice in those school participation, that are a big work for the teachers. But organising their activity with or without interference with the community is firstly their choice and it depends on several things... So I don't know if and how they would be something useful to do like this. Astirmays (talk) 20:49, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

I meant that professors should have the option to do their activities in a closed space, to join in a local group, or in public. I didn't mean to prevent them from working in public. Bye! --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:57, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

The Education Program extension allows the teacher (but arguably anyone if they know the link) to better track what's happening to students. It provides an at-a-glance of the class list, who wrote what article, and who are the reviewers in the class of the article. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:31, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

WikiKids in the Netherlands

There already is, for seven years now, WikiKids in the Netherlands. It's doing reasonably well, we think. We are a group of teachers that started WikiKids and are supported by Kennisnet who take care of the hosting. It's interesting to talkk about WikiKids as a sisterproject of Wikimedia. But what would that mean for us exactly? Apart from the fact that our connect would be moved to other servers? Gerarddummer (talk) 08:06, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Hi, thank you for posting here. I don't mean to bring a definite answer, other reactions are welcomed. However, it brought me to find this page : Wikifederalism which tells about should the autonomy to govern itself that each local wiki should have. By the way, I wrote on the page Wikikids/Review of current existing wikis akin to Wikikids#Vikidia : [Vikidia promoter/community] "expect that their project will keep its autonomy (in the same way that every Wikimedia project has its) and will not be altered by some restrictions to arise".

They may be quite a few technical benefits among which bot operated tasks that would be possible to let do (as long as you give them permission for it). The benefits may be a better coordination, not only with other Wikikids but more with Wikipedia in Dutch.

Would you check and complement Wikikids/Review of current existing wikis akin to Wikikids as for WikiKids.nl ? I personally know it, but not perfectly either. Do you feel that WikiKids.nl and how this project is expounded are much alike or that there is some difference ? Astirmays (talk) 11:50, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Talk:Wikikids/For children or by children ?

Copy from http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Wikikids/For_children_or_by_children_%3F&oldid=5385854

Hello, I would like to suggest to concentrate on the creation of a content wiki. The goal is to create content suitable for readers. Further educational goals (editing children) can get in the way. I saw a wiki with articles written by children, and they actually look like that. For children a closed school wiki seems to be a better idea.Ziko (talk) 21:50, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

The Dutch WikiKids has both purposes: learn how to edit on a wiki and profide suitable information for children. Both purposes are important, in my opinion. Gerarddummer (talk) 09:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

What is the best for the reader, would you say? And what about the hostility common on a wiki? Ziko (talk) 10:59, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The best for the reader is to realize that a wiki is filled with information from individuals. That's part of his digital literacy, I think. Maybe you should take a look on WikiKids and find out for yourself how much hostility there is on WikiKids. Gerarddummer (talk) 09:22, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

@Ziko:

• About the "hostility common on a wiki" I would say that there is certainly much less hostility on such a wiki than in the average schoolyard... Then I would quote Andrés Monroy-Hernández in Supporting an Online Community for Kids "At the same time, I would argue that a little bit of drama is healthy for any online community."
• about "the best for the reader", there is some arguments on Wikikids/For children or by children ?. Another one I think of, is that when a child starts an article, be it short and deficient, this child would typically take the subject seriously. Therefore an older editor that will correct and expand it will be led to continue to take the subject seriously. Although paradoxical, children participation may prevent from infantilization (which I think is not that much avoided on b:Wikijunior...) Astirmays (talk) 22:13, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Hi, sorry for the late answer. I think that people from all ages should edit. The French wiki seems to limit editing for adults because the goal is to have children write the content. Of course one can consider both goals (content creation and education in wiki using) important. But, for example, should an adult write an article, because content creation is more important, or should the adult wait for children writing, and then only copy-edit the article? Ziko (talk) 14:10, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

"The french wiki" Vikidia doesn't limit editing for adults. There is some adults that start and write many articles. Thus they make the content richer and more valuable. Children readers even so ask for more articles and more information in the articles. Wikimini does limit editing for adults, but that's another one and actually, this adoption proposal is from and for Vikidia. Astirmays (talk) 06:28, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Ah, thank's for the explanation, Astirmays. My point is that we have deal here with two different kinds of wikis:

• Content wikis such as Wikipedia, with the goal to create content. Everything done on the wiki is finally judged by the criterion whether the edit is bringing that goal further. Content wikis are usually open and public (can be read and edited by everyone, maybe under pseudonym).
• Educational wikis have the goal to teach something, and the content used or created is only a means to achieve that goal.

For example, imagine I read a content wiki "Wiki Encyclopedia for Children" and I see an article "poorly" written. Then I delete the former content and add my own version of the article, according to the standards of that content wiki. This would be the right behavior. But what if the wiki is an educational wiki? Then I would have spoiled the learning process and showed ill behavior. I should have tried to accept the errors in the article and/or contact the author with age appropriate suggestions for improving the article. An educational wiki is, as the introduction to Wikikids.nl makes it clear, a prolongation of the learning proces in the class room, a tool for the teacher.

If I understand it well, Wikikids.nl and Wikimini from CH are educational wikis, and Vikidia is a content wiki? And the proposed new Wikimedia wiki is also supposed to be a content wiki? Did I get this right? Kind regards Ziko (talk) 16:48, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Well, Vikidia is definitely a content wiki, that aims (and certainly achieve) to be a valuable and appreciated resource. It also welcome children and teenagers contributions since they willingly adhere to its aims as a content wiki. there is also school projects on Vikidia, just as on Wikipedia, so it is an educational wiki in the same time ! It is not so tricky as you may think to combine these two aims. For example we have some "Under construction" templates, some special for school projects. They have to be temporary, and then, we can better or even rewrite an article. We may just notice that a teacher that conduct a school project on Vikidia has to be well awarded on how it works, and that he can't make his pupils make any writing exercises, but only encyclopedic articles. they don't have to make a perfect work either, just to take it seriously, then regular users will correct it and make a good article out of the content they have brought in ! It certainly can be "educational" to have one's article corrected and expanded ! (As long as you know the game's rule in the beginning). In Wikikids/For children or by children ?, we explain how allowing and promoting children contributions is relevant even for the content objective.

We are not the first ones to do so : the Freinet movement has been publishing magazines for a long time, whom articles are prepared by pupils in classrooms after they have done some inquiries, interviews. These magazines aim to make a (serious) set of documentary resources for the classroom (see). All the same, these magazine articles are checked and reviewed in a similar way as in any magazine before they are printed, whereas on Vikidia, we check the contributions in a Wikipedia way, would you believe it can work ? ;-)

About Wikimini and Wikikids.nl: Wikimini is certainly typically an educational wiki, at least its principle is that only children write the content, adult would just make some maintenance. Its promoter claim that "Wikimini and Wikikids.nl are very similar projects", whereas I think that Wikikids.nl is more similar to Vikidia in its principles than to Wikimini. Wikikdids.nl is open to editors of any age, but we could just notice that for some reasons they may be significantly less adults that create and expand the content. It is reflected by the statistics on the size of articles, Wikikids being an intermediate between Vikidia (article with more content) and Wikimini. Gerarddummer wrote just above: "The Dutch WikiKids has both purposes: learn how to edit on a wiki and profide suitable information for children. Both purposes are important, in my opinion.". So I consider Wikikids.nl to be a very near project that could be adopted in the same set of wiki if they agree.

To be complete, I must add that Vikidia may be the most Wikipedia-like regarding decisions process (choosing sysops for example) whereas on Wikimini and Wikikids.nl, the founders decide alone to grant the sysop rights. I observe that children appreciate very much to be associated in the decisions process, and that with proper adult facilitation (and direct participation as well) it works as well as on Wikipedia again.

Still I guess that in the adoption into Wikimedia process, we will have to define the basic principles regarding the decisions process, that mean specify if Wikikids.nl could join with its current functioning regarding this point or would have to move to a more Wikipedia-like way of dealing with decisions, grant of sysop right...

That being said, I think the Wikikids.nl way (and Vikidia's also of course) to deal with writing articles and building the content is fully compatible with becoming a Wikimedia sister project. Astirmays (talk) 18:47, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

OK, thank you, I think I am starting to understand. So I can simply delete or rewrite an article just in Wikipedia, without breaking someone's heart. :-) The principal rules are important, yes. I would like to see a stricter regime regarding rude behavior compared to Wikipedia... Ziko (talk) 20:22, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Wikikids should be written for children and by children (only). The aim of the project should not only be having good articles, but children should also learn how to write them. Of course, adults can always write better articles, but it would be frustating for children having replaced their content with "the better version". How should they gain self-confidence and having fun in writing if older "pro-writers" doing it always better?--Sinuhe20 (talk) 19:51, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

There is several answers to make:

• It is not so frustrating for children having their content fixed and bettered, as long as they know the rules of the game, they can appreciate it,
• there might be about one child editor for 1000 readers. The readers want well-developed articles, nonetheless easy to understand, they ask for it on the Vikidia's guestbook,
• we don't systematically rewrite children's article, especially when they write about a subject of their own special interest such as a children television channel, while an adult would write in the same time about an historical people,
• we would sometimes keep a childlike wording, if factual and grammatically correct (deliberately as well as because each contributor feel he has enough to do before rewriting correct articles).

Wikikids is necessary

Hello, I think that there are articles in Wikipedia that are not suitable for children, which obviously can not be censored, but if you can create a version of Wiki encyclopedia for children like Wikikids or Wikiniños in Spanish, ..., being a Sister Project, because the issue of children's access to inappropriate content on the web is a real problem. There are already specialized encyclopedias for children like Vikidia, but not known because it not part of wikimedia. I'm sure wikimedia, you must have a free encyclopedia for children like Wikikids and should be a sister project. Thanks and sorry for my English. Jean70000 (talk) 23:38, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Indeed, nevertheless when you ask the children themselves, they would tell about too long and difficult articles on Wikipedia rather than inappropriate content. We get quite a lot of messages on the Vikidia's guestbook such as "merci de nous expliquer (au enfant de 8 a 13 ans)les definition que nous ne cromprenons pas car dans certain site ils nous parlent sur des mot d adulte au quel nous ne comprenons rien. alors moi je dis un GIGANTESQUE merci a vikidia" which translate : "Thanks for explaining to us (to 8 to 13 yo children) the definition we don't understand because on some websites they talk us with adults words of which we don't understand anything. so I say a HUGE thank-you to vikidia". This proposal includes adopting Vikidia in Spanish, fell free to tell about it as such and to edit this wiki ! :-) Astirmays (talk) 17:05, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Wikids

Isn't it Wikids a much better name than Wikikids? Just saying... --Felipe (talk) 11:21, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Hello, naming the whole thing is a difficult question, indeed. I think the following factors should be considered:

• It should be easy to understand from the name that it is a wiki
• ... and that it is for children / young people. Often, children don't wish to be addressed as such. :-)
• If possible, the name should be understandable in many countries, or at least for speakers of English. Maybe it can easily be adopted to other languages. At least, it should be easy to pronounce. "Wikikids", for example, is better than "the-juveniles-wiki".
• If the wiki belongs to the Wikimedia movement, this should be recognizable. "Wiki" isn't distinctive enough, and the WMF would have to register the name in many countries. Just using "Wikipedia" or "Wikimedia" in the name would make that easier (and cheaper).

Given these considerations, I like "Wikikids" and "Wikijunior", but "Junior Wikipedia", "Young Wikipedia" or "Wikipedia Kids" might be even better. Kind regards Ziko (talk) 14:15, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

"Wikijunior" would also be my favourite. "Wikikids" sounds too much american/english.--Sinuhe20 (talk) 20:06, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

Wikimedia Commons

Hello, would it be possible for the new Wikikids to use Wikimedia Commons as its media storage? I understand that some older childrens' encyclopedias have a media storage of their own because of unsuitable content on Commons... Ziko (talk) 20:24, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

I think this issue must be addressed at some point, because there're plenty of images on Commons that are not suitable for work or school. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:33, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

On Vikidia, we can either import or use directly the Wikimedia Commons files, but we then categorize these files on Vikidia. See for example http://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Fichier:Hyperion_PIA07740.jpg which was just used, not imported, but then it is categorized into Catégorie:Image satellite naturel dans le système solaire.

So we don't avoid to have a link on each image page to its source on Commons, but Vikidia has its own categorization in french or images bank. By the way, it may be some of the biggest image bank with french categorization.

We used to have a nice tool to help to put images from Commons on articles of Vikidia with keywords in french and without going on Commons itself, and that filtered images before. But it doesn't work anymore due to mediawiki upgrading and his developer being not active any more. We could make something similar again. Astirmays (talk) 18:19, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Ah, interesting. Maybe something for the future (the language issue is important too, yes). For the time being, I think the existence of unsuitable (not family friendly) material on Commons is not a major problem. Young people can stumble over unsuitable material everywhere on the web, also when using Google. Ziko (talk) 19:04, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

New sub-pages - Basic principles

Hi,

Ziko has launched, and I have edit and developed the Wikikids/Basic principles. Come and see, discuss and correct it !

We didn't mention there another sub-page : Wikikids/Questions and answers, based on frequent asked questions or objections that we have been able to collect in the previous discussions about Wikikids and anserw, partly filled out by the experience on Vikidia. Astirmays (talk) 21:32, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Wikikids and Mediawiki

Is Mediawiki the right software for Wikikids? Maybe it's not child-friendly enough, the syntax is probably too complex, the font size too small. I think children like more pictures and drawings (f.e. for the "edit"-Button) and maybe a more colorful interface.--Sinuhe20 (talk) 20:22, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

Children get can learn the syntax pretty well, young but regular editor typically write short articles, with all the proper templates (see). It seems much easier for them to get familiar with the Mediawiki syntax than to write much text. We may just find a way to make to put images in an article easier especially for beginners. Other patterns as images on the interface could be done within Mediawiki. Astirmays (talk) 21:23, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

Achievability of a Wikikids in english

Hi, I sent a message about that subject on the education mailing list : Achievability of a Wikikids in english. It's about the UK Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act of 2006. Maybe something to change on Wikikids/Questions and answers#Legal matters? Astirmays (talk) 22:01, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Wikimini

I just wanted to let people know of a similar project; Wikimini. Perhaps some inspiration can be drawn from there. --Jan Ainali (WMSE) (talk) 14:53, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks! @Jan Ainali (WMSE): see the list at Wikikids/Review_of_current_existing_wikis_akin_to_Wikikids#Wikimini. PiRSquared17 (talk) 15:00, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Yes, there is this other wiki. We had a discussion about it on the education mailing list, I sent this message amongst others: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/education/2013-April/000537.html "I made some statistics to compare these 3 wikis (Wikikids.nl, Wikimini and Vikidia) and I will upload it soon. It appears among other things that the average size of articles of Wikimini is 47% of the one of Vikidia, wheras Wikikids.nl/Vikidia makes 59%." It should be added that Wikimini actually does not ask to ba adopted by the WMF. However it can be a way to discuss the features of such a project (by comparing existing ones). Astirmays (talk) 19:06, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Merge these 2/3 existing projects seems to me to be a higher priority. Kelson (talk) 13:19, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

Hi Kelson, they were a fork between Okawix and Kiwix, I guess that you think you had some good reasons for that. Vikidia and Wikimini didn't fork, one was created after another (Vikidia and then Wikimini) We talked once or 2 about merging, but our respective objectives didn't make it possible. Astirmays (talk) 19:53, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

Simple English Wikipedia

IMO it is important to combine Simple English Wikipedia into this proposal. I guess the question is should the final product be WikiKids or Simple Wikipedia? We could let each language decide. Having both a WikiKids and a simple Wikipedia in the same language seem like too much duplication. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:30, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I like the look of http://fr.vikidia.org, but am concerned that setting up a new wiki as proposed would be a duplication of effort (or unnecessary forking). Simple English Wikipedia lists children as being example users of that resource. Has a proposal to rebrand the Simple English Wikipedia as Wikikids been discussed amongst participants there? -- Trevj (talk) 12:58, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Google Trends for existing Wikikids

Hi,

For your information on popularity of the two existing Wikikids that achieve to be active and get a quite large audience http://fr.vikidia.org and http://wikikids.nl/ , you may have a look at these Google Trends that compare their popularity trends in their main language area to 4 Wikimedia projects (excluding Wikipedia):

• Wikibooks, Wikiquote, Wikiversity, Wikisource and Wikikids in the Netherlands;
• Wikibooks, Wikiquote, Wikiversity, Wikisource and Vikidia in France.

You can try with wikinews, wikivoyage, wikitravel, commons: Commons has just been slightly overtaken by Vikidia in France (depending on the period of the year), the other are well below in both languages.

So what do you think is the next project to invest on ? ;-) Astirmays (talk) 20:32, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

German speaking kids

There is an interest in contributing to "a Wikipedia in German for kids" at the school attended by my own kids (in 2nd and 3rd grade). Is there any initiative where I could point them to, other than a proposal in Meta?  ;) Thank you.--Qgil (talk) 16:48, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

@Qgil: maybe ZUM-Grundschulwiki (link)? Maybe some others on that page have German versions, but that one is the biggest. PiRSquared17 (talk) 16:54, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, PiRSquared17. Looking at Special:RecentChanges and Special:Version (MediaWiki 1.13.1!). Not bad, but it doesn't look like a place that I would recommend. Looking forward to a new initiative. It's hard to believe that other German schools wouldn't pick this up with some coordination. But yes, a driver would be needed.--Qgil (talk) 00:34, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

Email

I contribute on it.vikidia, so yeah, I'm quite favourable :P Anyway, I don't get why "Special:EmailUser should be disabled". It's a fundamental tool, especially for sysops and CheckUsers (I'm sysop both on it.vikidia and on it.wikipedia, so I kinda know what I'm talking about :P )! --Dry Martini (talk) 12:08, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Launching Vikidia in English

We are launching Vikidia in English!

See: Vikidia in English opens today, let’s build a children wiki encyclopedia!

I hope you will like it! It follows this decision and the other "Wikikids" that exist in other languages. Astirmays (talk) 07:42, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Dear colleague, I must say that I am a little bit surprised of this move. Maybe I did not follow all relevant pages / talk pages, but the last thing I knew was that the Request for Comment was going to start soon. It would have been interesting to see at least the results of the request before changing the direction. Anyway, I wish Vikidia all the best, and hope that there will be a lot of opportunity to cooperate. Ziko (talk) 15:20, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi Ziko, well, I explained that on this subpage : Wikikids/Vikidia's withdrawal of the adoption proposal, it wasn't an easy choice, but with several reasons actually... Astirmays (talk) 17:29, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Kennisnet

Is this related? PiRSquared17 (talk) 23:37, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

This page is pretty old (August 2005). As far as I know, Kennisnet supports Wikikids.nl, which is nevertheless autonomous. Astirmays (talk) 21:20, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

German Klexikon

Hello, in order to complete our documention also at this place: since a few months, November 2014, a new wiki exists. Klexikon is a wiki encyclopedia with content suitable for children, in German. We have a short description in English here. Please feel welcome to come with any question or remark to me, also here on this page.

By the way, I liked very much the excerpt Mathias made from the Strategy initiative. In these days, I also reread the very interesting Harris report from 2010. Ziko (talk) 16:30, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

PS: Note our (Dutch language) meeting in Utrecht, March 28th. Ziko (talk) 16:56, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, I think I didn't read the third part af this Wikimedia Study of..., quite interesting : "However, it is our belief that our relationship to children is most powerfully presented in positive, not negative, terms, ie in determining what children should see, not what they should not see. " or "An active creation of projects designed for children would be, in our view, a more effective step." Yet nothing has really moved the last few years (except the creation of Klexicon ;-) ! ).

I announced the "Excerpt..." on https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2015-March/thread.html#77188 where they were a few shares. I talk about translations and tools on this message. Don't you think they could be there some efficient way to grow our content faster? (with quality) Astirmays (talk) 19:27, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Wikikids

There are exist projekt Wikikids on http://www.wikikids.nl. In my option is preferable name "Wikichild". --MDsmajlik (talk) 19:30, 6 April 2016 (UTC)