Learning in a digital age/LiDA101/Select open resources/Reliability of Wikipedia

Wikipedia is the free online encyclopedia created through collaborative effort of contributors from around the globe. Wikipedia is one of the most popular websites in the world. When conducting general Internet searches, Wikipedia articles will frequently be listed in the top results.

Anyone registered on the Wikipedia site can create a new article page. Anyone can edit a Wikipedia article, and registration is not required to edit existing articles.

There have been a number of studies examining the accuracy of Wikipedia articles. Notwithstanding the outcomes of these studies, many educational institutions will not accept the use of Wikipedia as a credible source for academic writing and research. In this section we invite learners to evaluate whether Wikipedia is a trustworthy resource and to form a justified opinion on its use as a reliable resource for academic writing.

We commence with an opinion poll on the reliability of Wikipedia and then invite you to annotate and comment on a few online articles on the topic. Finally, you will be invited to apply your knowledge on evaluating online resources to inform your use of Wikipedia for academic purposes.