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Wikidata:Wikidata educational resources

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Wikidata educational resources include tutorials, lessons, and curricula for learning Wikidata. Wikidata instructors can use these resources as a basis for any Wikidata training which they seek to provide. Wikidata students can examine these resources as they seek to learn to use Wikidata.

This page is not about teaching Wikidata itself, or to collect good practices for instructors. Instead, this page presents the educational resources which are available.

Introduction to Wikidata's educational resources[edit]

Wikidata hosts information which everyone finds relevant. Anyone, of any educational background, of any age, with any experience using Wikimedia projects, in any field of interest, using any language, might want to engage with Wikidata. Even though Wikidata is attractive to all sorts of people, it is not accessible to all sorts of people. Different users will have different goals, with common goals being learning to query Wikidata or contribute information to it.

Wikidata has features by means of which users can use tools in a more technical way or a less technical way. Sometimes, the more technical methods allow a user to manipulate larger data sets more precisely, but even the less technical Wikidata tools are accessible enough to make Wikidata a popular database for anyone to use and edit.

Because Wikidata's userbase is unusually broad the educational resources which suit different sorts of users are unusually varied.

Target audiences for educational resources[edit]

Using Wikidata requires some understanding of Wikimedia projects and data science. Students who already have these skill sets will require less training in those areas to engage with Wikidata.

After considering the extent of a user's technical and Wikimedia background, then next consider the user's goals. The most common activities for Wikidata users are data export (queries), data import (editing), and conversation with the Wikidata community about Wikidata and its information.

Non technical, no Wikimedia background[edit]

Some Wikidata users will wish to avoid technical interfaces in Wikidata and also have no prior experience contributing to Wikimedia projects. Typical education plans for this group are the following:

  • Without actually providing practical guidance for editing Wikidata, showcase Wikidata projects so that this group can have conversations about the impact and challenges of developing information in Wikidata
  • Provide practical guidance on doing a certain few simple and repetitive tasks in Wikidata without giving the background information which an experienced wiki editor would have on the activity. For example, creating or populating Wikidata items in a certain field or with certain suggested properties can be useful.
  • Demonstrate how to do Wikidata queries using a front end which matches the user's interest

Non-technical, Wikimedia background[edit]

Some Wikidata users will wish to avoid technical interfaces in Wikidata but will understand the nature of Wikimedia projects.

Skill sets which carry over from other Wikimedia projects include the following:

  • understanding of open content
  • awareness of how Wikimedia projects address copyright
  • inter-wiki links among Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, and more
  • applications by means of which structured data in Wikidata might propagate to other Wikimedia projects
  • Wikimedia practices for adding references to back claims
  • Wikimedia social customs for civility and discussion

This Wikidata user demographic might do any of the activities which users who are new to Wikimedia might do. Additionally, this group might like to do the following:

  • Discuss or set policy for the relationship between their home Wikimedia project and Wikidata
  • Explore manually editing Wikidata items on a range of topics
  • Use a variety of Wikidata front ends for queries
  • Gain an interested amateur's understanding of Wikidata's workings, including concepts like database, query, SPARQL, identifier, and others
  • Operate pre-made bots or automated assistants to do mass edits in the pre-designed field in which the bot operates

Technical introduction[edit]

Users who want a technical introduction are willing to engage with code, even if they have no prior coding experience.

Technical advanced[edit]

These users are comfortable manipulating datasets, making queries, using and adapting automated tools to edit Wikidata.

Typical skill sets in this user group include proficiency with Python, SPARQL, and R. Other skill sets might include being able to consider setting up an instance of Wikibase, professional experience working with databases, an ability to have technical conversations with developers, and other coding experience.

Resources[edit]

Help:Contents is Wikidata's own top level directory to its recommended educational resources.

Curricula[edit]

See also: Wikidata:Wikidata curricula

A Wikidata curriculum is a learning plan for a user to understand Wikidata overall.

Syllabi and Case Studies[edit]

A syllabus is a learning plan for a user to understand an aspect of Wikidata, perhaps over several lessons.

  • Human Centered Data Science, a 2017 course in the University of Washington Master of Data Science degree program. This could includes Wikidata lessons and examples throughout.

There are also several published case studies, which including design components for courses:

Guides published in Wikidata[edit]

Off-wiki guides[edit]

Video talks[edit]

Conference presentations[edit]

See also: Wikidata:events

Wikimedia conferences always feature presentations on Wikidata. These conferences may have recordings, slides, abstracts, or other supplementary educational resources to coincide with the talk. Currently there is no system for tagging Wikidata related conference talks.

Anything more[edit]


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