Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Introducing Lexemes Through Turkish Proverbs (ID: 22067784)/Final Report
Report Status: Accepted
Due date: 2023-06-26T00:00:00Z
Funding program: Rapid Fund, Wikimedia Community Fund
Report type: Final
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- Title of Proposal: Introducing Lexemes Through Turkish Proverbs
- Username of Applicant: egezort
- Name of Organization: N/A
- Amount awarded: 800
- Amount spent: 580.53 USD, 13689 TRY
Part 1 Understanding your work edit
1. Briefly describe how your proposed activities and strategies were implemented
We did presentations, contribution sessions, discussions, and a contest.
We first started with explaining what Lexemes were and what their purpose was. We then explained many things about how Wikipedia functions and what its core values are.
We had active contribution sessions in which students asked what could be contributed. We showed them what they could do, ranging from adding pictures to the "Combines Lexemes" feature.
We talked a lot about how Wikipedia works and responded to their questions. This took a lot of time but I believe that it was worth it both because it kept the students motivated and because understanding Wikipedia and Wikidata are important by themselves too and I believe that that was an important outcome of the project that the students understand the Wikipedia mindset better.
We used whatever device we had, ranging from computers, cellphones, to smartboards. We showed the changes to the entire classroom.
We had a lot of students who weren't participating. It was hard to have them keep quiet but we still managed. I believe that if we can do it again, we should arrange it so that the non-participants either leave the class or do something else, or better yet, having everyone participate. This of course depends on the school and the involvement of the other teacher.
I believe however, that having the teacher not interfere too much also helped the students feel more comfortable in asking us questions, so one should keep the pros and cons in mind.
2. Were there any strategies or approaches that you felt were effective in achieving your goals? Please describe these strategies and approaches.
I think that explaining the Lexemes in a holistic way really helped in painting a picture.
Teaching students that they could participate from home worked well for some students.
Doing this in literature class was an idea that we think worked, though it could also be done in computer class.
Giving out the merch in the end of the project was our idea of keeping the project alive in the students' minds, but we should have given them out before. Most students couldn't get the merch because it was the last week.
I think that the awards for the contests didn't motivate the students as much as we wanted it to. We had decided to make a small prize that was going to be equal for students if they contributed more than a set amount, but we ended up doing a prize for the first 3 students. They had found the awards too cheap, so we have to either come up with more expensive awards, or to distribute the awards in a different way.
Something we learned was that, it's always best to have a contact person from the class that can reach everyone, because with our 2 week gaps, there was a lot of stuff we could have done but couldn't do. This is also the case for the students creating their accounts, since we didn't have anyone to follow up with, we couldn't get the students to create accounts when they went home. Creating a Telegram group for the students could be a good idea (since it would also keep their anonymity)
3. Please use this space to upload media and other files that help tell your story and impact.
Field to type in URLs.
Everything related to the project is summarised in my user page (in Turkish, I can translate if needed):
4. To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the work carried out with the support of this Fund? You can choose “not applicable” if your work does not relate to these goals.
| A. Bring in participants from underrepresented groups | Not applicable to your fund |
| B. Create a more inclusive and connected culture in our community | Not applicable to your fund |
| C. Develop content about underrepresented topics/groups | Not applicable to your fund |
| D. Develop content from underrepresented perspectives | Not applicable to your fund |
| E. Encourage the retention of editors | Not applicable to your fund |
| F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Not applicable to your fund |
5. Is there anything else you would like to share about how your efforts helped to bring in participants and/or build out content, particularly for underrepresented groups?
We had noticed a lack in Turkish lexemes and this project addressed that. Since linguistic interest is not common in the Turkish Wikipedia community, I believe that this project started a process of building model Lexemes.
Part 2: Your main learning edit
6. In your application, you outlined your learning priorities. What did you learn about these areas during this period?
I had written: "I want to learn about the willingness about formal authorities to see the value in non-conventional means of education."
For this one, we didn't really need to do much collaboration with the school authority. They allowed us to use their classrooms and computer labs. They helped us contact a literature teacher. The teacher played a supervising role and didn't interfere with the project. So we didn't learn about their outlook on our project.
"I want to learn about ways of simplifying complicated concepts and of how young people tend to interpret information given to them."
I learned many things about what young people focus on. One of these was to demonstrate the practical use of these improvements. Students were interested in getting to do things before they understood everything, so maybe we can change the plan accordingly.
7. Did anything unexpected or surprising happen when implementing your activities?This can include both positive and negative situations. What did you learn from those experiences?
Yes, the whole project was filled with these.
One expected yet unsuccessful attempt was to get in touch with a high school that we had wanted. That high school didn't show interest in our project, so we contacted another one, which took some time.
One of the unexpected things was that we couldn't go to the school as often as we wanted to, thus the project took longer. This is due to the 1st of May being a holiday, the 15th and the 29th of May being the days after general elections (in which school isn't in session), all of these are mondays, which was our project day. This didn't affect us much except for the unexpected results of the fifth week (mentioned below)
The first week went as planned.
The second week was the week in which we went to the computer lab for everyone to create accounts. We had mobile data in order not to be stopped by the account number block, but the computers didn't have wireless capabilities, thus many accounts couldn't be created. The physical layout of the room and the operating systems of the computers were also weird so we couldn't do much.
The third week, we decided to talk more about the project and the competition we would be holding. It was an okay week.
The fourth week, we thought we'd have access to the computer lab but we didn't, so we asked the students to use their phones. It worked out way better than expected.
The fifth week, we expected low turnout (school stops taking attendance), but very few people came so we couldn't do it.
8. How do you hope to use this learning? For instance, do you have any new priorities, ideas for activities, or goals for the future?
I couldn't talk much about the learning above due to the character limit so I'll talk here.
We learned that it matters a lot if the activities are mandatory for the students. More than half of the class showed no interest in the project so we couldn't do anything with them.
We learned that we should check the physical area of the classes and the computer labs in order to make sure that we can use everything properly.
We learned that we should always have backup plans if everything else fails. When Gufo46 thought of utilising the cellphones of the students for the project, that saved the project, otherwise we would have had a lot less contributions.
We learned the way of teaching Lexemes was close to what we had in mind but not quite perfect, I think we have more experience with what we should and shouldn't focus on while teaching these, this is a skill we'll utilise a lot if we continue with this project.
The difference between the teacher interfering and not interfering is a huge difference. Both have their upsides and downsides.
A main takeaway was that, we should either do these projects in circumstances that the activities are mandatory for the students (through grades, attendance etc.) or with students who are especially interested. One of the most efficient sessions was when half of the class didn't show up (due to another school activity) and we could control the classroom better.
We'll create the backbone of our next project, keeping these in mind.
9. Documentation of resources: Use this space to upload any documents that would be useful to share with others (e.g. communications material, training material, presentations).
Here is an additional field to type in URLs.
Everything that we documented is here. It's all in Turkish, I can translate it if needed.
Part 3: Metrics edit
10a. Open Metrics reporting
In your application, you defined some open metrics and targets (goals). You will see a table like the one below with your metric in the title and the target you set in your proposal automatically filled in. Use the tables to report the result. Use the comments column to describe any aspects of this result that you find relevant. If the results were different from the initial target (goals) then you can explain why and what you learned from this. You can also provide any qualitative analysis regarding these results. In the last column please describe the tools and methodology used to collect this data and any difficulties you might have had.
| Open Metrics | Description | Target | Results | Comments | Methodology |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Proverb count | Total number of Lexeme proverbs on Turkish Wikidata | 100 | 6 | Since we couldn't do the proverb part of our project, we had contributions of words mostly. | Sparql, manual inspection |
| N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
10b. Core Metrics reporting
In your application, you defined targets for some core metrics and targets (goals). You will see a table like the one below with each core metric in the title and the target you set in your proposal automatically filled in. Use the tables to report the result. Use the comments column to describe any aspects of this result that you find relevant. If the results were different from the initial target (goals) then you can explain why and what you learned from this. You can also provide any qualitative analysis regarding these results. In the last column please describe the tools and methodology used to collect this data and any difficulties you might have had. Note: a table will appear for each Wikimedia project content contribution you defined in your proposal.
| Core metrics | Description | Target | Results | Comments | Methodology |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 20 | 30 | There were sessions in which the whole class was present. Around half of them didn't pay attention but everyone was there. | ||
| Number of editors | New editors: The students who will participate | 30 | 7 | Only 7 students decided to create accounts, since it wasn't mandatory | Counting |
| Number of organizers | 2 | 2 |
| Wikimedia Project | Description | Target | Results | Comments | Methodology |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wikidata | Turkish Lexeme words | 100 | 229 | Some students really exceeded our expectations | SparQL |
| Wikimedia Commons | Generic pictures of everyday items. Intended to be added to the senses part of Lexemes. | 10 | 17 | Not new pictures, but pictures that are added to the Lexemes. | I counted through ctrl + f in the students' accounts that made image contributions |
| Wikidata | Turkish Lexeme proverbs | 100 | 6 | As I said above, we couldn't do the proverb section of the project properly due to some reasons | N/A |
| Wikidata | Turkish Lexeme forms and senses | 100 | 300 | N/A | This is a rough estimate, we subtracted Lexeme additions from total edits and assumed that most were forms and senses. |
| N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
12. Did you have any difficulties collecting data to measure your results? This could include things like a lack of time or resources, or the expertise in your team to collect this data. It could also include difficulties with particular data collection tools.
No
12a. State what difficulties you had.
N/A
12b. How do you hope to overcome these challenges in the future? Do you have any recommendations for the Foundation to support you in addressing these challenges?
N/A
13. Use this space to upload any documents and provide links to any tools you have used that would be useful to understand your data collection (e.g., surveys you have carried out, communications material, training material, program and event dashboard link, project page on Meta).
Here is an additional field to type in URLs.
N/A
14. Have you shared these results with other Wikimedian communities (either affiliates, user groups, volunteers, etc., different to yours)? This can include things such as data and direct outcomes, lessons you have learned, or information on how to run or recreate your programs.
No
14a. If yes or partially, please describe how you have already shared them and if you would like to do more sharing, and if so how.
Part 4: Financial reporting and compliance edit
15. & 14a. Please state the total amount spent in your local currency.
13689 TRY
16. Please state the total amount spent in USD.
580.53 USD
17. Please report the funds received and spending in the currency of your fund.
17a. Upload a financial report file.
17b. Please provide a link to your financial reporting document.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11WOWw4-Hw3t6nDYR1lju0X0lDISETxRG8f-5bZ204ag/edit?usp=sharing
As required in the fund agreement, please report any deviations from your fund proposal here. Note that, among other things, any changes must be consistent with our WMF mission, must be for charitable purposes as defined in the grant agreement, and must otherwise comply with the grant agreement.
17c. If you have not already done so in your budget report, please provide information on changes in the budget in relation to your original proposal.
We changed the currency type in our payments in terms of the USD, because otherwise we would be losing out value due to the depreciation of TRY.
18. Do you have any unspent funds from the Fund?
Yes
18a. Please list the amount and currency you did not use and explain why.
220.11 We didn't use a lot of it, because the participation from students was lower than anticipated, thus we didn't give out as many awards as planned. Also the merchendize was cheaper than we anticipated.
18b. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
B. Propose to use them to partially or fully fund a new/future grant request with PO approval
18c. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
I want to reapply for a Lexeme project in the future. It's not going to be this quarter but maybe it can be the next. If I don't apply, or if my application gets rejected, I can send it back to the WMF.
19. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement?
Yes
20. Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement?
Yes
21. Are you in compliance with provisions of the United States Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), and with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Funds as outlined in the grant agreement? In summary, this is to confirm that the funds were used in alignment with the WMF mission and for charitable/nonprofit/educational purposes.
Yes
22. If you have additional recommendations or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here.
I think that the formula for proverbs still holds for the future of this project. Had we had a better computer lab, we would have been able to get the students to contribute proverbs as well. I'm saying all this because the lack of the proverb contributions makes this project look meaningless at a quick glance because it has proverbs in the name. I think that doing a similar project again, perhaps in different circumstances, because it's easier to apply to more prestigious schools when having done a project in the past, we would be able to get the students to contribute proverbs too.
Another thing is, we are planning to use the lights and microphone to record a tutorial type video for Lexemes in a few months. We had planned to do it before we started the project, or during it, but we didn't have as much free time as we had anticipated. We have a lot more free time now since it's summer vacation.
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