04.+Reliability+&+Authority

=**Wikipedia just to get started**= Cheng's article discusses recent research about students' use of wikipedia, part of //Project Information Literacy (PIL)// at the University of Washington. Students usually use wikipedia to get started with their research project but do not tell about it to their professors who discourage their students to use Wikipedia at all. Students are clear about Wikipedia's limitations as a valid resource. The reasons for **WHY** students turn to wikipedia are something we educators need to think about. What type of needs wikipedia fulfill for students?

They need an idea of what to write about, they need to be prepared before they turn to their instructors, it is convenient to get started.

I think these needs reflect on our insufficient digital literacy as instructors and learners. Instructors assume students possess sufficient subject knowledge and research skills they need to construct a research based assignment based on provided scholarly resources. To research a topic the learner first needs to define the topic itself. That is when Wikipedia can help. It gives the big picture and provides directions for further readings. Wikipedia to starting a research project is like a road map to driving to an unfamiliar location. With its usually simple to understand language, Wikipedia gives a fast and easy acquisition of background knowledge and can also act as a "priming" tool.

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