Homeschooling wiki announces winner
Houston, TX (PRWEB) August 30, 2006—Knowhomeschooling.com is a new community-based website. As part of its grand opening, the owners held a drawing in mid-August for $500. Knowhomeschooling.com is pleased to announce Katherine Loop as the winner of their $500 prize.
Knowhomeschooling.com (www.knowhomeschooling.com) was created by husband and wife homeschooling parents of five, George and Jill Manty. Jill enjoys researching and often uses Wikipedia, the most well-known community-based website, or wiki.
“While Wikipedia is great for many researching general topics, it is not really ideal for finding in-depth information on a specific topic,” said Mrs. Manty. “We thought that we could take the idea of a wiki and create something really great for the homeschooling community.”
Although there are many homeschooling websites out there, Knowhomeschooling.com differs because it will utilize the collective wisdom of all participating homeschoolers to provide exposure to a wider variety of resources for homeschoolers. Rather than depending on only the research or interests of one person creating a website, a community edited website can reflect the tastes, opinions and knowledge of a whole community.
When asked why they ran a contest for their grand opening, Mrs. Manty had this to say, “We are really excited to provide this opportunity for homeschoolers, but we also recognize that homeschoolers are often Moms who aren’t aware of the latest technologies. Even though learning something new can be a bit intimidating, we know that homeschoolers aren’t afraid to step outside of their comfort zone when they need to. We created the contest to encourage homeschooling Moms and Dads to take the step to learn how to add things to the wiki. We really felt that if they tried it, they would see how easy it is and would continue to participate in the wiki.”
Any homeschooler who registered and created or edited a page between mid-July and mid-August was eligible to compete in the drawing. When the random drawing was held, the winner was 21 year old homeschooling graduate and website owner Katherine Loop. Miss Loop wrote an article on Math from a Biblical Worldview that reflects the information found on her website, www.christianperspective.net and in her book “Beyond Numbers, A Practical Guide to Teaching Math Biblically”.
Miss Loop explained how she plans to use the money to further help the homeschooling community.
“I’m currently working on a supplemental curriculum for homeschoolers that presents the different concepts in math biblically, and see the $500 as God’s perfect provision to help with those expenses.”
She further added, “The money came as a little hug from heaven. A few days prior to winning this, my brother had just been given a $500 scholarship for doing well in college. Meanwhile, I was home trying to keep the house in order while my mom was gone for three weeks caring for my sick grandmother. The Lord has used this to remind me that He has not forgotten about me, that I am doing what He wants, and that He will meet my needs before I even know about them. I am going to write this down in my book of God’s provisions/lessons that I don’t want to forget so the memory can encourage me for years to come.”
The wiki has grown considerably since it started in mid-June. Mrs. Manty definitely feels that the contest was part of that success. She also pointed out that many homeschoolers have been instrumental in spreading the word.
“Harvey and Laurie Bluedorn have been really supportive, sending out information about the wiki to various lists they’re on. Scott Somerville was also instrumental in getting the word out to homeschooling bloggers who added the first large batch of information to the wiki. We’ve been really encouraged by many emails from homeschoolers who feel like this is something that can really benefit the homeschooling community. And we just couldn’t be happier about the way God has used the contest to encourage and support Katherine in her desire to reach out to the homeschooling community and continue in the work he has called her to.”
All homeschoolers are invited to participate in the wiki, even though the contest is over. Adding pages or editing is really a pretty simple process, and there is even a tutorial on the site to walk writers through the process.
