Statement:
During the Spring 2016 semester we completed our pilot project testing the viability of a cross-disciplinary pedagogical exercise tasking students with using static photography, historical photography, immersive 360 photography, animated gifs, and/or written analysis presented in an interactive online map. Our students produced shareable, mapped, immersive experiences exploring and analyzing the surveillance culture and historical land use change on Creighton University’s campus. Based on initial student evaluations, the project prompted students to think more critically about their surroundings, whether in the context of Creighton’s history or its surveillance culture. Several students reflected that the project challenged their preconceptions about their lived environment and added depth to their understanding of their surroundings. Based on their maps and reflections we are refining assignment guidelines, expectations, and objectives.
Products:
Below are the artifacts we are using to assess student learning in preparation for a poster session at Assessment Day and our Final Project Report.
COM 174: Surveillance Culture
Final group map–Campus surveillance
Reflection essay– self-reflection on mapping project.
HIS 317: Mapping History
Final group map – Creighton (Then & Now)
Blog posts – surveillance & redlining
Actions
Based on the feedback we received from our students, their products, and our analysis of the assignment we are revising our expectations for next year to increase student learning.
- COM 174
- Students will be broken into two groups and produce two maps. This will increase each student’s immersion in the project.
- Students will be given a more structured data collection spreadsheet to help eliminate issues related to building their map.
- Students will be given clearer directions for their analysis, setting expectations and parameters.
- HIS 317
- During the Spring 2017 semester, students were expected to complete their VR map as well as their final project in the second half of the semester. The next iteration of the project will take place in the first half of the semester to separate the two time-intensive projects.
- Project teams (4 students each) will be given set of buildings to research, instead of the campus as a whole. This will allows students to conduct more in-depth historical research to contextualize their immersive photos.
- Student will be given response questions and blogs prompts that more explicitly reference the assessment questions
- Students will be given clearer directions for their analysis, setting expectations and parameters.
A copy of our presentation can be found below
