Education/Newsletter/March 2013/Medical English students begin work with Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia

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Student learning how to upload photos into Commons

Two classes of Medical English (advanced English for students studying medicine) at ITESM-Campus Ciudad de México have begun working on projects related to Wikipedia. The purpose of working with Wikipedia for this foreign language class is not only to produce bilingual content but also to explore the Wikipedia community through resources such as Wikiproject Medicine. The first task completed was to upload photographs related to their field to Wikimedia Commons, which can be seen at Category:Photos_donated_by_Spring_2013_Medical_English_class_ITESM_CCM The second task was to translate good medicine-related articles from English into Spanish.

The new/improved articles in Spanish Wikipedia include es:Embarazo_abdominal, es:Páncreas artificial, es:Peso del recién nacido, es:Amaurosis fugaz, es:dieta alcalina, es:Tejido adiposo, es:Acondroplasia, es:Distonía, es:Aneurisma, es:Córnea, es:Donación de sangrees:Dracunculiasis, es:Hidrocodona, es:Fibriochondrogénesis, es:Escuela de Medicina de Baylor, es:Examen de médula ósea and es:Balanitis xerotica obliterans. There are two reasons to do the translation in this manner. First is that Wikipedia in English is much larger than Wikipedia in Spanish and second, it shows students that their English language skills can be put to use to benefit people in their native culture/language. Translation is being done in groups, with peer review being essential not only to check the Spanish but also to discuss the challenges inherent in translation, a task most proficient language learners do in the real world. To see more about Wikipedia projects on this campus go to Education_Portal/Projects_and_Programs/ITESM-Campus_Ciudad_de_México/Spring_2013