Wikipedia and Spreadsheets in Classroom Instruction

After reading the NPR articles i have concluded that Wikipedia is obviously not a good resource for information because it is not reliable anymore. It lacks an encyclopedia reputation according to the accusations made by the "Wired" program. The technology grad student found a data service that can detect the changes the parties on Wikipedia make to their own information. In a way this is good because we are able to see how certain business and the government portray themselves as opposed to the correct information given by Wikipedia about them. Any program that has some way for anyone to hack in and change information is not a reliable source for research. The data service invented is helpful in detecting the truth, but we should not have to also check that site every time we go to Wikipedia. These are important groups and information we are talking about too including, congress, Diebold voting machines, and popular industries like Walmart that supply most of the country with jobs.
Spreadsheets can be used for many things in the classroom to help teachers teach children certain subjects and for the children to have an easier way to learn and see how things work this way. The most common way to use spreadsheets is in mathematics. The sheets can be used to produce a bar graph, line graph, scatter plot, or chart teaching information in a more visual way for students to learn. The access of a spreadsheet is easy to use so students can pick it up themselves and calculate problems easier. For example, students can enter data into cells, that data is organized then to where they can enter functions to calculate it for a sum, mean, or product of anything etc. Having the information organized into the cells makes it easier for a student to see how the function or formula, what have you, is completed because it is like a step by step process.
For lower grades, graph spreadsheets would work well in class taking surveys or using for comparisons of data or statistics being studied. A grade book spreadsheet is probably the second most common use for a teacher. This would be easy to enter grades names and separate one class from another for your records. You could also average the grades easier this way because they would be in columns and organized. Spreadsheets for older children can incorporate higher thinking skills in some lessons since the children are comparing, organizing and eventually arriving at a conclusion. According to this website, http://www.ceap.wcu.edu/houghton/EDELCompEduc/Themes/Spreadsheets/spreadsheets.html
"the use and creation of spreadsheets is required by some states in the Computer Literacy competencies for all preservice and inservice teachers and their faculty."