Wikipedia uses in learning design: A literature review

Abstract

This paper is a literature review report concerning educational uses of Wikipedia in the first 10 years of its existence. The aim of the work is the tracing and the presentation of published and validated educational applications of Wikipedia in a manner that could inform learning design by teachers or researchers. For the review, 24 scientific publications, retrieved from research databases and concerning educational applications of Wikipedia were analyzed. The review reveals a variety of learning uses of Wikipedia in several contexts, knowledge fields, education level and students’ ages. In addition, the study shows a variety of expected learning outcomes and a pleiad of student tasks in the learning activities. Both, the learning outcomes and the students’ tasks are organized in general types with the aim of constituting patterns for new learning designs. The findings are commented and possible future directions of research are described.