Brief summary
Wikidata for Education is a curricula digitisation project aiming to align Wikimedia projects with school curricula with the help of Wikidata. Piloted in Ghana, the project proved the concept that Wikibase software helps structure curricula data. The model was later replicated in Uruguay.
Wikimedistas de Uruguay was able to show the data with the help of an interface developed by Wikimedia Italy's project Wikipedia e la Scuola Italiana. It consists of a static website that visually represents the data stored in a TSV file, plus a Python script that generates this TSV by calling different APIs
Wikidata for Education is in need of an interactive and engaging user interface so that Wikimedia contributors, teachers, and the general public can visualize and explore the curriculum topics and structure. Wikicurricula is a good starting point, but it still needs several improvements before it can be considered Wikidata for Education’s UI.
The main goal of this project is to use Wikicurricula as an interactive and engaging way to visualize curriculum structured data on Wikidata.
For this, we need to:
- Create a boilerplate project with accurate documentation, so that Wikicurricula can be reusable for new countries and languages.
- Improve Wikidata’s integration with Wikicurricula
- Improve Wikicurricula’s user interface
Skills required
Required
- Basic web development skills.
- Intermediate proficiency in any programming language, preferably Python
- Being comfortable around databases, spreadsheets and datasets
- Basic Git usage
Appreciated
- Familiarity with SQL/SPARQL/Wikidata Query Service
- Experience with d3js library
- Basic understanding of Spanish or Italian as the project is mostly documented in Spanish or Italian
Possible mentor(s)
Technical Mentor: @Piracalamina
Technical Mentor: @Sannita
Project Mentor: @SPatnaik
Useful links
Boilerplate
- The repo we'll be working on: https://github.com/wikicurricula-uy/wikicurricula-boilerplate
Italy - Wikipedia e Scuola italiana
- Visualization: https://itwiki-scuola-italiana.toolforge.org/
- Codebase: https://github.com/giovannipro/giovannipro.github.io/tree/master/wikipedia-scuola-italiana
- Data gathering script: https://github.com/wikicurricula-uy/curriculaBot/blob/d90de51751d7e5e83f12f9a7fa7c1f1660483aa3/bot.py
- Meta page: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_e_scuola_italiana
Uruguay - Wikicurrícula Uy
- Visualization: https://wikicurricula.wikimedistas.uy/
- Codebase: https://github.com/wikicurricula-uy/wikicurricula-uy.github.io
- Curriculum topics query: https://w.wiki/7P$C
- Data gathering script: https://github.com/wikicurricula-uy/curriculaBot
Ghana
- Curriculum topics query: https://w.wiki/7Zge
- Presentation about Wikidata for Education at Network of Open Orgs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1s07g-SmE0&t=1222s
- Presentation about Wikidata for Education at EduWiki Conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdsbh64LwhQ
Wikidata for Education
Get familiar with...
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Introduction
- SPARQL: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:SPARQL_tutorial
- Toolforge: https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Toolforge
Microtasks
Boilerplate+Documentation
- Write documentation on how to make a local install (in your computer) of Wikicurrícula Boilerplate. The visualization is a static HTML+CSS+JS. The data-gathering folder contains scripts that are run manually.
- Write documentation at the Readme file on how to feed the visualization with data from a new curriculum. The instructions should include building and running the Wikidata query. Remember that, for the time being, only Uruguay's and Ghana's curriculum are structured in Wikidata.
- Write documentation on how to deploy Wikicurrícula Boilerplate in Toolforge. You may practice by migrating Uruguay's Wikicurricula from it's current hosting (Github Pages) to Toolforge.
- Translate the boilerplate's interface to English
- Parametrize code variables in bot.py to match each Wikipedia's configuration file [] Implement - and deploy at Toolforge - Wikicurricula for Ghana's national curriculum, with reference to the English Wikipedia. Document the process at the boilerplate project, or improve the documentation that has been previously written. Which parts of this process are the most cumbersome? What can we change in the code, or automate, so that new implementations are easier? If you come up with any ideas, write a Github issue
UI Improvements
- In the Spanish version of the data-gathering script, the feature that counts the templates (avisi) added to an article is not working. Fix and enable this feature.
- In the visualization, make it possible to order the articles in the x axis by number of references
- Create a view that shows the curriculum topics that don't have an article in the analyzed Wikipedia (topics of Uruguay's curriculum that don't have an article in the Spanish Wikipedia, topics of the Ghana's curriculum that don't have an article in the English Wikipedia)
- Add to the visualization's subject popup the grade and subject each curiculum topic belongs to
Ready to start?
- Make your pull requests to the Boilerplate repo.
- Many files such as voci_2023.tsv, subjects.tsv, query.tsv contain hardcoded data that should not be included in the boilerplate. They have been included in the repo for your reference, but feel free to remove them and add them to the git ignore once we have proper documentation.
- Remember that the goal of this project is to create a boilerplate that can be easily adapted to other countries and languages needs. Clear documentation, descriptive names and comments are more important than the features themselves.
- Email datos at wikimedistas.uy or message @Pirakalamina on Telegram for more info
