Talk:Wikimedia Girl Geek Dinner/Manchester November 2014

Trainer reflections

This was my third training event. I think it went very well. Everyone will have gone away with a good feeling about Wikipedia and I’m pretty sure some of them will continue to edit. I’ve put some more specific points below.

• No real surprises. Very similar to last year.
• As with last year, we ran ahead of schedule and managed to do verification and citation before lunch.
  • Maybe we don't need so much time for the first half!
• We had some good questions from the trainees
  • Showed understanding
  • Allowed us to explain things they had been wondering about
  • Felt like a dialogue.
• Mike leaving messages on people's talk pages introduced the concept of talk pages slightly before scheduled, but it all worked out OK.
• Very nice venue.
• It was nice to go to the pub with some of the trainees, but I don't think they were expecting other Wikimedians to be there. If we explain it during the training session then that would work better.
• We did get a comment about how it was difficult to start a new article
  • Increasingly true as time progresses and all the important subjects get written about
  • Most participants chose to edit existing articles, rather than create new ones.
  • Perhaps we should aim the afternoon session more at what it became - editing existing articles - rather than creating new ones.
• We did get a suggestion of making the session shorter.
  • The idea is that more people will come because they don't have to give up the best part of a day.
  • Doable - especially given that we got through so much in the morning.
  • It would leave less time for more free-flowing editing. But it could work - especially if we aren't aiming at creating new articles from scratch.

Yaris678 (talk) 20:21, 26 November 2014 (GMT)