I love Wikipedia. The whole school knows. Seriously, that’s part of how I was introduced at the opening assembly this year.  I’ve spent dozens, if not hundreds, of hours over the years caught in its intriguing web of links. I not only appreciate the way Wikipedia serves as a well-organized repository of much of the world’s knowledge, but also the democratic and collaborative principles that underlie it. However, I don’t love it when my students cite directly to it, in fact I discourage it in no uncertain terms.
Am I a hypocrite? Actually, I don’t believe so. Just because Wikipedia is entertaining (not to mention enlightening), doesn’t mean it’s an appropriate research source. The very nature of Wikipedia (or any wiki generally) is that multiple people can edit it, which effectively means that its content is always changing.
While this is great for collaborative editing, it’s a bit more problematic when you’re looking for specific facts. When you add in the fact that unless a Wikipedia article is protected anyone can edit it, this issue becomes even more extreme. Let me repeat that. Unless a Wikipedia article is protected, anyone can edit it. Statements without attribution thus call to mind the immortal words the Dude (look him up on Wikipedia!): “Yeah, well, you know, that’s just, like, your opinion, man.”
Fortunately, however, Wikipedia recognizes this issue itself and insists that statements in articles be cited to a “reliable public source.” Put another way, this means that you should be able to find any “facts” on Wikipedia somewhere else. In fact, this is Wikipedia policy! (And yes, I recognize the irony of citing Wikipedia, but hopefully now you do too.)
What does this mean? Wikipedia is a great place to start your research (or procrastination). I’ve found the citations (available via clickable footnotes which generally themselves contain clickable links) quite useful, in fact on a number of occasions Wikipedia has led me to articles or books that I’ve proceeded to use in lessons. Of course I’ve also spent far more time procrastinating, but I can’t really blame Wikipedia for that, just myself!