Scottish Edupedia

Posted on | December 3, 2006 | 6 Comments

One of the ideas that we took to the LT Scotland sessions in Stirling last week on emerging technologies, was the notion of a ‘Scottish Education Wiki’, or a Scottish Edupedia, as some have already begun to call it. If this took off, it could eventually become the prime source of information on any aspect of education in Scotland. The idea came from a discussion between my LTS colleagues, Jim Henderson and Paddy Patterson (who also have another great idea for using wikis for a national project across all our schools – more of that another day!).

Because I’m heading off to pastures new, I have started the process of researching the education systems of the 133 (!) countries in Cisco’s Emerging Markets theatre – it’s early days, but it is already interesting to discover just how difficult it is to obtain up-to-date information covering some basic facts on many of these countries. Wikipedia is good but patchy as yet in relation to some of this basic data – however, the Web is a big place and I am gradually finding more and more fertile sources of information. But it’s taking time.

If the notion of a Scottish Edupedia took off, then perhaps over time other countries would follow suit and we would end up with a global resource covering education across the world. To get it going in Scotland, first, we will need as many volunteers as possible to start writing about any aspect(s) of Scottish education they happen to have some expertise in. Just a few knowledgeable individuals being prepared to kick the idea off with an article or two might be enough to really get the whole thing going.

It would be good to hear back from the blogosphere – what do you think?

thanks to Neil for the photo

Postscript – it’s important to get your attributions right in a post, and I got one wrong above, so let me correct it before Jim, Paddy or Laurie tell me anyway. The idea for the Scottish Edupedia came not from Jim and Paddy, but from Laurie – sorry, guys

However, Jim and Paddy did come up with another great idea for national wiki project – watch this space!!

Technorati Tags: wiki, ltsfutures, edupedia, wikipedia, scottisheducation, cisco

Category: business, cisco, education

Comments

6 Responses to “Scottish Edupedia”

Ian Stuart
December 3rd, 2006 @ 8:23 pm

p>Interesting you should say that.
The idea is being looked at in Technology education circles.
In a very little way a Design education wiki has been started.
This grew from a workshop last summer in finland, at the Avro Alto Institute, I was lucky enought to get invited too.
Joe Wilson
December 4th, 2006 @ 2:46 am

Why not use Wikipedia for things on Scottish Education system broadly
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Scotland
The bones are there already and you instantly become part of much wider educational community.

I would like to see Wikis around curriculum development – In the College , Workplace and community learning sectors for instance we need to engage large and varied constituencies in qualification development. Too often those in classroom feel that those who represent them don’t do a good enough job and equally employers and sector skills councils often don’t have sound enough ideas around learning practice. Wikis that allowed these communities to contribute in vocational domain would speed up the whole cycle of vocational curriculum development. If we did it in the right way we would get contributions from overseas too.

I am sure it would be similarly useful in School sector. A Curriculum for Excellence Wiki would be a great place to start.
Let’s think life long learning and global learning and Scotland can make a mark.
AB
December 4th, 2006 @ 10:47 am

I’m all in favour of a site that is community owned and developed, but I think I would require the ‘critical mass’ so as not to fall by the wayside as so many other educational projects have.
Gordon McKinlay
December 4th, 2006 @ 4:42 pm

I think that we need to explore more of web 2.0 tools and the idea of a wiki in Scottish Education is a good one. LTS needs to be driving Scottish Education and this will help us at local authority if those in power see others using the tools in creative and interesting ways.
Joe Nutt
December 6th, 2006 @ 5:27 pm

Naturally sceptical (it’s why I’ve survived this long and has nothing to do with half empty glasses) I always make sure I absolutely satisfy myself I fully understand any technology before advising customers on its use. Wikis are a fascinating case in point. I suspect most of the Wiki advocates have never editing anything substantial in Wikipedia. I have. (See Wikipedia’s entry for John Donne.) What concerns me is the instability and lack of serious provenance and academic quality of muc of the information. Christina Odone recently had some Wikipedia contributor correct her place of birth… in her own entry, after she had explained she was Christina Odone! I have seen some of the most absurd facts attributed to Donne over the past few months. I’m also saddened by the level of abusive atacks entries seem to attract. You really need to make a effort to explore the histories to some entries to discover this. I take my hat off to the army of invisible Wikipediasts who doggedly try to remove these and give the site some sort of learning value.
Keith Large
December 26th, 2006 @ 9:37 pm

Hello Joe, please contact keith_large@yahoo.com reference Burton Grammar School reunion April 2007. sorry to intrude here.