Fieldwork from desktop: webdoc for teaching in the time of pandemic

ABSTRACT

The article suggests an alternative teaching material to adapt to the current Covid-19 pandemic that impedes outdoor activities such as fieldwork or external visits in the university. The authors explore web documentary (hereinafter webdoc) as an option for asynchronous online teaching methods, an alternative to enable learning experiences. The result presents the students’ response to a survey with close- and open-ended questions based on their experience of two different webdocs (Montelab and Trozos Urbanos). The results demonstrate great potential for webdocs in online teaching due to game element, emotional engagement and entertainment. Students felt empowered by the interactiveness of the webdoc which led to an overall positive evaluation. Moreover, the experience was well received when it was in line with course materials with potential to communicate geographical knowledge around interdisciplinary urban challenges. Therefore, teachers should dedicate efforts for identifying appropriate webdocs to provide students with beneficial geographical learning experience that fits the course aim. On the other hand, minor negative feedback was observed based on personal interest and the general cyber fatigue from the pandemic. We suggest teachers to explore webdocs based on their needs and conclude by providing a list of recommendations and useful references.

KEYWORDS:

• Web documentary
• ICTs
• online
• covid19
• fieldtrip
• external visits

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Real Decreto 463/2020, de 14 de marzo, por el que se declara el estado de alarma para la gestión de la situación de crisis sanitaria ocasionada por el COVID-19.

2. see Royal Geography Society website: https://www.rgs.org/research/higher-education-resources/virtual-field.

3. Course syllabus: https://ddd.uab.cat/pub/procur/2019-20/g104525a2019-20iENG.pdf.

4. Real Decreto 926/2020, de 25 de octubre, por el que se declara el estado de alarma para contener la propagación de infecciones causadas por el SARS-CoV-2.