Jess Goes Interactive

« Backchannel thoughts | Main | Worms: The Great Patootie »

September 26, 2005

Open Mic: Interactive History

A topic that interests me, perhaps an inkling of a thesis, perhaps not. An interesting investigation nonetheless.

Games to teach history
SchoolHistory.co.uk: http://www.schoolhistory.co.uk/games/
- Does this work?
- Does this count as interactive history?

Demanding active learning
New Intelligence Inc. Announces: Interactive History of the United States:
A Text Reconstruction Program for Improving Reading, Writing, and Reasoning Skills
http://www.newintel.com/USH_1.html
- Does this really engage the student more?

Immersive Education: http://www.immersiveeducation.com/uk/Products_Default.asp
- "Kar2ouche is cross-curricular role-playing software for producing pictures, storyboards, animations, movies, comics, handouts, posters and magazines."
- "MediaStage is a virtual reality performance editing platform for making and editing performances using a cast of virtual characters, 3D environments, 3D props and a virtual camera and lighting rig. Students can build their own sets, instruct the characters to move, pose and behave in a specific way, as well as giving them speech (either using text-to-speech or by recording sound files which the charcters speak back). Performances can be played back in virtual reality, allowing viewers to navigate in 3D around the performance while it happens."
- "Krucible is science simulation software for secondary pupils, covering Waves, Optics, Energy and Forces. It lets students and teachers choose to create their own experiments using real-time computer simulations, turning the PC or Interactive Whiteboard into a virtual laboratory."
- What new forms of projects can this software afford?

Interactive Lessons
http://www.schoolshistory.org.uk/interactivelessons.htm
example: http://www.schoolshistory.org.uk/firstworldwar.htm
- Should this be a standardized way to run a history course?
- Does this create a significant change in the way history is taught?

Databases - Piece it together yourself
Manhattan Project: http://www.mbe.doe.gov/me70/manhattan/
Klondike Gold CD-ROM: http://www.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/exhibit/showrev.cgi?path=22
- "In other words, is the ability to move back and forth between subjects, and between text and images, an invention of multimedia? Clearly not; what is unique, at this stage in its development, is the ability to add sound and moving images, and substitute the loading and display of computer files for the flipping of pages."
Assemble newspaper: http://www.headlinehistory.co.uk/
- So this is active learning of sorts - how do you motivate an audience to participate in this outside of a class assignment?

Wiki History
Pearl Harbor: http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/
- What sort of history could this give us?
- What are issues with this method?

Interactive Maps & Timelines
http://www.u-s-history.com/
PBS Kids - History of Jazz: http://pbskids.org/jazz/time/
- A first step - where can these lead?

Immersive Historical Environments
Ideal Classrooms
http://www.landmark-project.com/ncsh/room.php?rm_id=34&floor=epg.php
- What are practical take-aways from this project?

Reenactments
Medieval: http://www.knightstour.org/
- What sort of a digital experience can rival a "living history" park?

Panoramas
U-505: http://www.msichicago.org/exhibit/U505/virtualtour/vr_tour/index.html
- How can this experience be incorporated into a larger lesson and message?

Games as simulations - Medal of Honor, etc.
Colonial Williamsburg as an MMORPG
http://cms.mit.edu/games/education/revolution/index.html
Interview with Jane Boston, Warren Spector, & Will Wright on simulations:
http://edoneel.chaosnet.org/seriousgames/interview.txt
- Jane Boston: "[Simulations] are better suited for those things that need to be learned in context and require active problem solving"
- Will Wright: "Simulations are great for understanding processes that are outside of our experience. You can play with time or scale."
- Are these a useful medium for teaching compelling history?
- What makes a historical game different from a historical movie?
- What is dangerous about using historical fiction in this (or any) medium as part of educational instruction?

History as game environment:
http://www.activehistory.co.uk/Miscellaneous/free_stuff/renaissance/frameset.htm
- How is this method useful?

Investigating facets of a particular place and time
PBS - Colonial House: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/colonialhouse/history/index.html
- How can this experience be elaborated on?

VR
John Bonnett: "In this study, I argue that 3D-immersive environments - Virtual Reality - should not be construed as a thoughtless import from popular culture. On the contrary, I suggest that VR, properly applied, has the potential to heighten the effectiveness of historians, as teachers, as communicators, and as researchers. Specifically, I suggest VR can be used to heighten the critical thinking skills of students. I further suggest that VR will soon enable environmental, urban and cultural historians to produce models of far greater range and sophistication than is possible in print."
http://mcel.pacificu.edu/JAHC/JAHCVI2/ARTICLES/bonnett/bonnett.HTML
- What can be gained by VR as a history teacher?
- What are pitfalls of using VR in this way?

Multi-faceted stories
Raid on Deerfield, MA: http://1704.deerfield.history.museum/
Digital History eXplorations - hearing multiple accounts; music, art, etc. from time period: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/learning_history/
- What's the next step?
_________________________

Overall discussion questions:
1) What did you enjoy about learning history?
2) What did you hate about learning history?
3) What sorts of interactive experiences do you think would be most enjoyable in a history classroom?
4) What sorts of interactive experiences do you think would be most educational in a history classroom?
5) What sorts of interactive experiences would compell you to learn about a historical topic today?
6) How can interactive and immersive historical experiences help our research and understanding of past events?

__________________________

Papers
1) Slava Gerovitch, "Toward an Interactive History of Science and Technology: Reflections on the Dibner/Sloan Web Project"
http://web.mit.edu/slava/homepage/interactive.htm
2) John Bonnett, "Following in Rabelais' Footsteps: Immersive History and the 3D Virtual Buildings Project"
http://mcel.pacificu.edu/JAHC/JAHCVI2/ARTICLES/bonnett/bonnett.HTML
3) Edward L. Ayers, "The Pasts and Futures of Digital History"
http://www.vcdh.virginia.edu/PastsFutures.html
4) Maria Roussou, "Immersive Interactive Virtual Reality and Informal Education"
http://ui4all.ics.forth.gr/i3SD2000/Roussou.PDF
5) Laia Pujol, "Archaeology, museums and virtual reality"
http://www.uoc.edu/humfil/articles/eng/pujol0304/pujol0304.pdf
6) Gary J. Kornblith, "Venturing into the Civil War, Virtually: A Review"
http://www.historycooperative.org/cgi-bin/justtop.cgi?act=justtop&url=http://www.
historycooperative.org/journals/jah/88.1/kornblith.html
7) Peter Teuben, Piet Hut, Stuart Levy, Jun Makino, Steve McMillan, Simon Portegies Zwart, Mike Shara, Carter Emmart, "Immersive 4-D Interactive Visualization of Large- Scale Simulations"
http://www.adass.org/adass/proceedings/adass00/reprints/P1-39.pdf

Journals
1) History Now: http://www.historynow.org/06_2005/index.html
- includes an "Interactive History" section (games, etc.)
2) Council for American Studies Education:
http://www.casechicago.org/modules.php?name=News&new_topic=5
- includes an "Interactive History" section (recipes, geneology, etc.)
3) Journal of the Association for History and Computing: http://mcel.pacificu.edu/jahc/JAHCindex.HTM

Posted by rosenblj at September 26, 2005 01:22 AM

Comments

Post a comment