lit review: Interpretive Master Planning

Ok, I have gone a bit off the garden path—I know. Seems I can find relevance in most anything.

Interpretive Master Planning by John Veverka (1998) was brought to my attention during some student presentations last week. I took a peek, thinking there might be something of use here. I was right.

Although this book gives guidance on building displays, there is some helpful cross-over advice for teaching classes. After all, displays are a form of teaching. Veverka writes that a display is to “provoke visitor interest and to relate the interpretive message to their every-day lives” (2). I believe that my classes should do exactly the same thing.

The author gives examples of activities and their learning concepts/principles. He also explains the theory and planning behind display design to make the display’s message most effective. He ends the book with a section about making presentations, including checklists for planning and implementation. As a budding Toastmaster, I always find this sort of advice helpful and thought-provoking.

If you agree that teaching and displays are related, take a look at this short book and bibliography. It is an easy read with lots of visuals and point-form text.

Full title: Interpretive Master Planning: The essential planning guide for interpretive centres, parks, self-guided trails, historic sites, zoos, exhibits and programs.

Snapshot impressions #5--fifth class of the Fall 2012 term

I like to joke about this one, saying that "Civil War is coming to the archives." Although misleading, this statement is true.

The American Civil War class has come to the archives annually for more than three years. This is an exciting classroom experience for me. Why? The professor not only sees the value in the archives, and therefore wants to forge deeper connections between the archives and all of his classes, but he uses the archival sources as an opportunity to tease out details from previous lectures. I am always in awe of his ability to do this. I have learned a great deal about the War from these sessions alone.

In the past, the prof has asked me to find connections between the University, the Province, and the Civil War. It was no small task that first year, but I did find a few connections. After listening to the prof talk during that first archives session, I investigated more leads and more even more connections. He wanted more, though; he wanted personal narratives to make that connection. On that front, I am still searching.

This year, I was asked to find sources that gave political, social, and economic context to the War. Again, I set Amber on the trail of sources. We had more than I realized. Amber and I examined each source for that context and chose the best of possible sources. I wanted one source for each student in the class of 45. This time the speed dating exercise would probe deeper into the source, making a direct connection to the course and allowing time for the prof to lecture based on details discovered by the students.

We did four rounds of dating. The first round was short, asking each student to find one, interesting detail. The second round was also short, asking about the purpose of the book. The next two rounds were more probing with questions asking about connections to other events in the states between 1861 and 1865 and if the source gave voice to the North or the South as well as how the source helped with the students' understanding of why the War happened. As each round was completed, the prof made direct connections to the content of his previous lectures. He also prompted the students, drawing out their responses during the discussions.

My observations, with the benefit of hindsight:

• four rounds was too many, given the time we had to do the session and the depth of the questions. The students responded that they wanted more time to examine their source and think about the questions
• directly linking the lectures to the sources makes the archives relevant to the students' needs
• working closely with the prof to deliver the session is very valuable. I need to find ways to do this with more profs

Snapshot impressions #4--fourth class of the Fall 2012 term

The Pre-Confederation history class comes annually for a session in the archives. Each time, the course is taught by a different professor with a different emphasis. The number of students enrolled gets larger every year. In essence, I reinvent the session on a yearly basis. I need stability for this course. I need to create a session that is broad enough to satisfy the goals of different profs without my starting from scratch year-after-year.

Fortunately, I have two things in my favour this term. My keen research assistant, Amber, wants to find a solution for this "problem". She scoured the holdings for appropriate sources with speed dating in mind. The speed dating method is really made for this class; all other sessions were merely practice runs. We can maximize our time and put multiple resources in the hands of students. Not only is Amber keen for this exercise to work, but the prof is too. He had not taught this class before and could see the value in this session. All that is left are the logistics!

We divided the class of 57 students into two sections. The archives can accommodate 20 people comfortably (40 people squished). We chose a number in between. The prof took half of the class for 45 minutes of instruction in the classroom while I gave the first session to the other half. Then we swapped.

I have explained speed dating in previous posts, so I will not get into specifics again. My observations of this session:

• due to time restraints, the sessions were very quick. I could not accomplish everything that I wanted. Still, the students saw a wide range of relevant materials.
• speed dating was well received by the students and generated lots of discussion.
• the first and second group approached the session very differently, with different results.
• the enthusiasm of the prof is key to the success of the session. The prof asked us to shape three archival questions to be used on his final exam.

Overall, the session met the goal of the prof and the needs of the students. What's more, I  now have a flexible session that I can opt to use next year and the year after and the year after that...

Taking a shallow breath

As I sit here, reflecting on my sessions, it feels as though I am repeating myself in the blog. I guess it appears that way because the same technique is bing used throughout the term's sessions--speed dating. Still, it is a technique that works and it is one that needed perfecting.

Are we there yet? Perhaps.

Amber and I have taken these past few days to relfect on the term and project into next term. More on our progress later. I still have two more sessions to share.

Snapshot impressions #3 -- third class of the Fall 2012 term

Finally, a chance to let loose and really experiment. The third class of the term was a public history seminar with five students. The professor wanted me to talk about challenges and opportunities for archives. She gave me three hours to do so. Let’s have fun and generate some interesting discussion too!

Since I had lots of time, I also wanted to get their feedback on my own (future) research question. So, two weeks in advance of the class, I asked each student to select and read a finding aid created by my institution. I gave them no further instructions. They all came in with difference ideas of what would happen. Because they had advised me of their choices in advance, I had pulled the records for them. When they arrived for class, I gave them a printed copy of their finding aid and asked them to look at it in conjunction with the online version. After a few minutes, I have each student the records that matched their finding aid. When they had looked at all of this information for 30 minutes, I gave each student six questions to answer with a 25 minute deadline. We then came together for a group discussion. I collected some great feedback on our finding aids for my future research project.

Now, let’s turn to the challenges and opportunities that I was asked to address. I wanted to get the students’ ideas instead of leading them to see my points of view. As each student arrived for the session, I gave them a paper with the words “opportunities/challenges” and lots of blank space. I asked them to do a word association and write down their ideas. After a few minutes, I collected all of the slips of paper for my review. While the students worked on the finding aid exercise, I had an hour to prepare for the opportunities and challenges portion of the class. I was already semi-prepared as I had guessed many of their responses would be about funding, digitization, etc., but I wanted the time to get organized for the discussion. When we came together for this exercise, they found that I had written all of their responses on two white boards. I started by asking the students which point they wanted to discuss first. This was their chance to tell me what they wanted to talk about in the class. As we talked, we also discussed some prepared, supportive, and relevant videos (e.g., Tom Nesmith’s questions to Min. Moore in a Winnipeg café), newspaper articles (e.g., the funeral and protest in front of LAC), and digital documents.

In the final part of the class, I asked them a few questions about personal responsibility with respect to public history. Amber and I had prepared six questions and written them on flip charts. In this portion of the class, I brought out the flip charts and placed them all around the room. The questions literally surrounded us with the intent to generate discussion. Each student selected a question to ask the group and start a discussion. The questions had no specific order and we discussed them randomly.

Want to see how I did it? Check out “No expiration date” at this address: http://archivallessons.blogspot.ca/2012/11/no-expiration-date.html

How did it all go? There were mixed results. I found the students were, at first, reluctant to engage in the open format. As the class continued though, the students became more comfortable with leading the discussion. The finding aid section was very productive. When the students were working individually, looking at records, and answering questions about the finding aid, they were very engaged.

All five of the students have returned to ask additional questions and work on their assignments. They have come to me with well-considered questions and a list of potential research sources.

Will I try this format again? Yes—yes, I will.

Snapshot impressions #2 – second class of the Fall 2012 term

The next class presented somewhat more of a challenge. Not only was the class 45 students-large, the professor wanted her students to learn how to do historical research about the role of nutrition when treating diseases such as cancer or heart disease. My mind went immediately to the cover of a past Archivaria featuring medical archives. The cover shows a poster which claims that the staff are 100% tuberculosis free.

Tuberculosis—that was my hook. This archives does not have information about cancer or heart disease (to my knowledge), but records of the local Sanatorium are housed here. The problem was that the San records were unprocessed. I decided to take the risk and let the students use the records. Why? From my quick survey, there did not appear to be any original order that the students might destroy. I also felt that the students would not remove any records, which seemed to have no monetary value. Besides, the benefits of allowing the students to see the records were too great to pass up.

I divided the students into groups. Each group was given a box of unprocessed archival records and a selection of books received from the Sanatorium’s medical library. After setting the stage and advising on handling, I invited them to go through their box and books. I encouraged each group to discuss the contents while answering a number of pre-determined questions. This was meant to be more of a self-driven exercise, allowing time for the students to share their learned knowledge. Three of the five groups engaged in meaningful discussions.

To read about this exercise, visit my other blog at http://archivallessons.blogspot.ca/2012/10/100-tb-free.html.

Before and after the exercise, I read a few paragraphs from one honours thesis, published in 2007, and written by a History and Biology student. The purpose of these short readings was to demonstrate that historical research can bring together meaningful and (sometimes) untraditional disciplines.

Was the exercise successful? Yes. One student asked to make an appointment to review sources for another class assignment. One student asked about other archival sources in the country. But, perhaps the best gauge of success was in the answers to our exit question. Approximately one-third of the students answered the question in a way that demonstrated an understanding of historical relevance to their research. A few students related past treatment of tuberculosis to current treatments.

Snapshot impressions #1 – first class of the Fall 2012 term

Our first session was really four sessions. Why? The class was large so the archives session needed to be capped at 20 students per session.

So, I did the same session four times over two weeks in order to reach everyone. The discipline’s liaison librarian attended two of the four sessions. Class one was the more experimental as I needed to “feel out” the exercises and their flow. Class two and three went well with a few modifications. By class four, my heart was no longer in it. I was not looking forward to doing the session again. But, that final group of students was so enthused and energetic, they carried the day. The fourth session may have been the most rewarding.

Each time I did very little as an introduction. The activities that got students thinking critically started immediately. I challenged them to think about dining on campus with a visual, conceptual, and verbal experience. In fact, they entered the room to find one of the tables set up like a formal dining table. Then, I moved to guiding them through their own discovery of the history of nutrition as it had been taught on campus since 1925. Finally, the students did a speed-dating exercise with several predetermined sources and specific questions. Although these activities were done with guidance, the students were still free to form their own impressions or judgments on sources, while experiencing the process of research. They approached the exercise with some reluctance and then with enthusiasm. Even the least enthused students perked up at various points of the session and participated fully in the discussion.

I have provided the entire lesson plan at http://archivallessons.blogspot.ca/2012/10/nutritional-archival-sources-now-being.html.

The students showed their new found appreciation of the Archives by returning, often with their entire group, to work on the assignment. This was the highest return rate ever for a single class. What’s more, the students continued to use the research room while bringing in sources from the regular, Library stacks. Often they asked questions or for resources and advice that were well outside of my specialty. In the spirit of collaboration with my Library colleagues, I referred students regularly to the Reference Desk for additional help.

There has been a lot of positive, second-hand feedback too. Both the professor and the department Head have commented to me directly about the feedback they have received from students. Many students did not at first see how the Archives could help them with this assignment, but they have changed their minds. I am told that the students have continued to share their findings with other students in the department.

These sessions were a risk. But, I was determined to expand my sessions beyond the “traditional” courses that use the Archives. Nutrition was one of the “non-traditional” courses selected. Was it the most successful experiment of the year? More sessions are to come.