Students transform Maryville’s campus into an augmented reality gallery using new digital technologies.
Students transform Maryville’s campus into an augmented reality gallery using new digital technologies.
Cutting-edge digital technology is not the first thing most students expect when they enter a history classroom, but that’s exactly what Maryville University students encountered in the classroom of Lisa Lillie, PhD, assistant professor of history and director of the history program.
The innovative class, entitled Historical Methods and Digital Humanities, required students to use augmented reality technology to create guided tours of Maryville’s campus. Students used their iPads or iPhones and the HP Reveal app to load historical images, information and even videos about Maryville’s nearly 150-year history.
The images, information and videos then instantly appeared on their screens when they hovered over interactive “hotspots” located across campus. The augmented reality content appears onscreen against the backdrop of their surroundings.
Using augmented reality, students embedded a photo of four Maryville undergraduates posing with the statue of Mary in the 1970s against today’s modern backdrop outside Charles M. Huttig Memorial Chapel.[/caption]
The augmented reality technology embeds imagery into the world itself, transforming what you see in a way that’s visually convincing. Lillie said using augmented reality technology in the classroom is helpful for students because they already consume information in this way. “Students use augmented reality every time they use a Snapchat lens,” she said. “Now, they are using this technology to interact with history the same way they interact with their friends.”
For students, the technology not only helped them interact with history, but also provided new ways for them to think about their futures. “Before this course, I thought of history as a very traditional subject,” said Maryville sophomore Aminata Camara. “This course has shown that it can be modern and open up many different paths.”
Courses like Digital Humanities that make history exciting and relevant for today’s students are more important than ever before. According to a recent study by Northeastern University professor Benjamin Schmidt, the percentage of history degrees issued by U.S. colleges has declined significantly since the 2008 financial crisis. Meanwhile, the need for historical thinking to understand complex issues like impeachment is great.
That’s where Lillie’s Digital Humanities course comes in. One of the course’s many goals is to help students learn how to use technology is new ways that are not only fun but also educational — and potentially profitable.
“The class gives students hands-on problem-solving and technical skills in high-demand areas like app design and development,” Lillie said. “We also work on developing students’ online personas and building their own websites. They come out of the class with an electronic portfolio they can share with any potential employer.” Lillie rounds out the class with visits from guest speakers, such as the director of the Missouri History Museum’s Research Library, the Science Center’s Collections and Special Projects Manager and St. Louis University’s head of Gifts and Scholarships. The speakers introduce students to a range of careers they can pursue with the help of a humanities degree, like history.
“I’m not a history major, but this class is really cool,” said junior Alex Locke. “It lets you know what’s in the job market and how to get into graduate school, while providing a good base for whatever you want to do.”
The first step students took on their journey was around campus. Their mission? To make videos of fellow students discussing their knowledge of Maryville history. “It’s surprising how little students know about campus,” Lillie said. “They walk by monuments, buildings and historical sites every day and take them for granted, not knowing anything about them.”
During the interview process, students took note of sites they would like to know more about. Then, they developed lists of questions about their chosen sites before setting up appointments with Maryville knowledge consultant and archivist Emma Prince, ’13. In the Maryville University Archives, they completed visiting researcher forms, identified the boxes of materials they needed, had them pulled one at a time and then paged carefully through each until they found the information or images they needed. Finally, they used their iPads and iPhones to load content into the HP Reveal app before placing AR content around campus based off specific locations.
“Dr. Lillie and I both wanted students to know what goes into conducting original, archival research, even though the project itself was digital,” Prince said. “Just like they need to know the history behind the things they walk past all the time, they need to know what goes into creating website content, just like the websites they use every day.”
The process opened students’ eyes to regional as well as campus history, including how the two have intersected over the years. “A lot of students were unaware of Maryville’s ties to the Religious of the Sacred Heart,” Prince said. “Talking with them about that led to discussions about how St. Louis is special because so much of its history comes from French Catholics who migrated from New Orleans and the South, rather than from the East Coast.”
But as the students themselves explain, there was nothing trivial about the class. They are now better scholars, problem-solvers and consumers of digital technology who are well-versed in the pros and cons of augmented reality.