The virtual past for future archaeologists: Enhancing teaching through e-learning in Archaeology

Status: in progress

Description

Using virtual learning environments (VLEs) for teaching and learning has been shown to have fundamental benefits at a Higher Education level because of its ability to support and encourage a wide range of learning styles. In recent years this recognition has seen fundamental developments in e-learning at an HE level nation-wide. We propose to develop an e-learning package that will act as a vital resource for enhancing teaching and learning across archaeology, and which will also be easily transferable to history and classics.
At present, only a small proportion of archaeology courses at the University of Manchester use a degree of web based learning, yet annual module feedback from student appraisals and staff teaching reviews has highlighted the desires of both to develop and increase the department’s e-learning provision. Consequently this project aims to review and significantly enhance the provision of archaeology specific e-learning resources in the department of Archaeology at the University of Manchester; develop a suite of e-learning resources which will be available for teaching archaeology, or adapting for teaching history and classics at other HE institutions nation-wide; undertake a pilot study to examine the efficacy of such resources in supporting learning in the undergraduate degree.

To meet these aims this project would be undertaken in two phases. In the first phase we will seek to evaluate both the extent of current e-learning provision in the archaeology department at Manchester and to identify where and how this might be developed, through consultation with staff and students. In the second phase the project will produce three different online resources for teaching and learning. These will have the potential to act as stand-alone generic resources.
For each general area/theme the resource produced will aim to address fundamental interpretive questions specific to the theme itself. Each resource will also be aimed to enhance practical undergraduate skills in professional practice. Critically, the resources will be designed so as to transcend divisions between theory and practice by enabling students to draw specific links between both strands of learning.

Melanie Giles
University of Manchester
Melanie.giles@manchester.ac.uk

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