Iterative Pedagogy Adam Crymble a crymbleherts ac uk

Iterative Pedagogy Adam Crymble a. crymble@herts. ac. uk Digital History Research Centre University of Hertfordshire • Case 1: • Case 2: Starting where last year left off ‘Adding value’ for an audience

What History Students Do • Work with old stuff. • What can it teach us about dead people? • Arrive thinking the answer is always in a quote. • We want them to analyze.

Typical History Assignment Answer the same essay question as the students have answered for the past decade. Why? Scarcity of resources

A Sea-Change: The Internet & Digitisation now have an abundance New opportunity to build rather than repeat.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Case 1: Starting where last year left off History of Britain and Africa (1750 -2000) • Level 4 survey. • Thinking about relationships Essay question: Were people of African descent integrated into London life in the 1700 s?

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Black Experience in 18 th c. London Text-rich descriptions of crimes (but lots of details also on what people were like)

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Year 1: Find 50 relevant entries Needles in Haystacks: ‘the black dog’, ‘the Black Boy public house’.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Result of Year 1 • Build students’ advanced searching skills. • 517 trial accounts out of 100, 000+ contain references to people of African descent. • Students then wrote essay using these sources.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Year 2 • Students given list of 517 trial accounts containing references to people of African descent (running start). • Given 20 each to read carefully to identify anything ‘interesting’. Results shared with whole class • Dataset is being iteratively improved, results always shared.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Outcomes • • Year 0: random keyword searching Year 1: relevant records identified Year 2: most interesting cases identified …year 3, 4, 5… • Thousands of hours of work, shared.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Case 2: Designing for an audience Digital History Workshop • Level 6 module. • Purpose is to learn to build digital resources for other historians. • Facilitating rather than doing research. • Very public facing.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble The Historical Source Alumni Oxonienses, British History Online • Mini-biographies of 60, 000 Oxford students, 1500 -1714. • Students challenged to make them better…

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble The Task • Extracted from original record – Date of studies – County of origin – Name of colleges attended • Added from external source – Population of county at time of admission – Definition of degree studied for • Calculated – Year born (using age and date of admission)

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Outcome Year 1 • Students produce professional, public-facing resource for colleagues. • Forced to consider needs of audience. • ‘Published’ online, with citation guide to ensure students receive credit.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Year 2: Using the new resource Intro to Digital History • Level 5 module. • Analysis-based research • Includes digital mapping of historical data. • Research focus.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Year 2: Mapping and Interpreting • Given dataset and taught to build digital map • Told data was built by students. • Challenged to interpret patterns of student recruitment. – Not possible without the ‘added value’ from previous cohort.

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Mapping Results 1649 -59 1660 -75 Origin of students who attended Lincoln College Maps by David Eddy

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Student Conclusions Students able to challenge conventional historical interpretation with this new evidence (Potentially publishable new research findings!) 1660 -75 Maps by David Eddy

Adam Crymble - @adam_crymble Benefits: • Students see themselves as ‘real’ historians – (beyond private work for tutor). • They are making new discoveries – (more interesting to read). • Plagiarism more difficult – (can’t ask friends for essays). Challenges: • Can I publish on the research findings? • (ethics of student effort). • Can I force students to contribute to collective endeavours? • (ethics of student work).

Iterative Pedagogy Adam Crymble a. crymble@herts. ac. uk Digital History Research Centre University of Hertfordshire • Case 1: • Case 2: Starting where last year left off ‘Adding value’ for an audience