Wikipedia:NIOSH/Course
This is a five-week course offered by invitation to NIOSH staff and partners being held during June–July 2024.
NIOSH has a goal of improving Wikipedia’s coverage of OSH topics given its visibility to the public, and especially to workers [1][2]. The goal of this webinar series is to identify gaps and inaccuracies in an OSH topic of your choice, and learn how to fix them through writing a short (one paragraph) addition to a Wikipedia article. Each participant will be guided through the process of choosing a topic, selecting source documents to write from, and writing an addition to a new or existing article. Instruction will also be provided on interacting with the community, contributing and using images and other media, and working with Wikidata. Scientists and communications staff who have already completed the introductory Wikipedia training are welcome to participate.
Logistics
The series will run for five weeks, starting in mid-June. There will be a one-hour webinar each week, and about 2–3 hours of outside work each week. The webinar times will be determined in consultation with the participants. Webinars will be through Teams.
Prior to Week 1
Assignment
- Review the NIOSH Quick Start handout.
- Find two wrong or missing things on Wikipedia to share during the webinar.
Additional resources
These are optional, but are helpful if you want a more in-depth treatment of the material.
- The Impact Of Wikipedia—a video featuring Wikipedians and their motivations for contributing
- Editing Wikipedia—a guide intended for students editing as part of their classes, but still mostly relevant
- Editing Wikipedia Articles on Medicine—a health-specific handout
- Training modules—Some specific modules of these are listed below, but feel free to look at others
Week 1 (Week of June 17)
Webinar topics: course logistics, clearance, editing demonstration
Assignment for next week
- Create a Wikipedia account if you haven't already, and register on the course Dashboard.
- Make your user page. You can use the special code {{Userbox NIOSH}} to include a boilerplate message.
- Review the Reliable Sources handout and the "How to make an edit" video.
- Make at least one edit correcting an error or gap you found. (You can do more than one if you want!)
Additional resources
These optional training modules are useful if you want more in-depth information
- How to Edit—guidance on using both Visual Editor and wiki markup
- Editing Health Topics—special rules for selecting sources for medical and health articles
In addition, you may want to refer to the policies and guidelines on Verifiability, Neutral point of view, No original research, Identifying reliable sources, and Identifying reliable sources in medicine.
Week 2 (Week of June 24)
Webinar topics: selecting reliable sources, core content policies, uploading and reusing media on Commons
Assignment for next week
- Review the Uploading to Commons handout and video.
- Upload at least one image onto Commons and place it in an existing article. (It can be the same or a different article as the text assignment.)
- Select a NIOSH publication and adapt 1–2 paragraphs into a Wikipedia article, including wikilinks and a reference.
Additional resources
- Wikipedia Policies—more information about the five pillars and core content policies
- How to reuse Commons media files—information on how to properly attribute media reused from Commons
- Licensing on Commons—but only if you want to see how deep the rabbit hole of copyright law goes for non-U.S.-government works!
Week 3 (Week of July 1)
Webinar topics: selecting a topic, interacting with the community (talk pages, WikiProjects, Did You Know, Good Articles and Featured Articles, WikiJournal)
Assignment for next week
- Select two possible articles (new or existing) for your three-paragraph contribution. Add the citations of potential sources to your sandbox.
Additional resources
- Sandboxes, Talk Pages, and Watchlists—a tutorial on how to use these features
- Directory of WikiProjects—a listing of all WikiProjects sorted by topic
- Content assessment—explains the criteria for different quality rankings, including Good Articles and Featured Articles
- Did you know—overview and rules
Week 4 (Week of July 8)
Webinar topics: Introduction to Wikidata
Assignment for next week
- Watch the Wikidata video
- Optional: add or improve a statement on a Wikidata item
- Begin drafting you three-paragraph contribution in your sandbox
Additional resources
- Wikidata Introduction and Tours—information about the basic structure of Wikidata
- Wikidata Query Service and its documentation—a tool to use a script to get and visualize data from Wikidata
- QuickStatements and its documentation—a tool that does batch edits for importing data to Wikidata
Week 5 (Week of July 15)
Webinar topics: Using Wikipedia as part of your workflow
Assignment for the future
- Fill out the course questionnaire.
- Go forth and keep being Wikimedians!
Advanced assignment
- Write a first draft of your longer contribution in your sandbox.
- Make a comment on another participant's draft on their user talk page.
- Finish your draft and move your contribution to main space.
- (Optional) If eligible, nominate your article for DYK.