Students taking a full Geology degree would have done much more field work by this stage. In the past a certain amount of time on the field trip was taken up introducing students to geological fieldwork and repeating some material from the lectures. The students are generally up to speed by the end of the weekend but at the beginning are not sure what to do. 

The approach.

The project was initially funded by a SALT small projects grant, which enabled the filming if the field work to be done

The lecture course is inevitably organised by topic but fieldwork activities combine features covered in several different lectures. However, some students try and relate what they see to a specific lecture. The videos are designed to help move away from this compartmentalised way of thinking and prepare them for the field work activities. Each video is between 2 and three minutes long and is a mixture of video and still photographs with a narrated explanation. The key to the videos is the script, which has to tell a story – starting with a puzzle, showing the field evidence and then either solving the puzzle or making a statement about the material. The videos were made using Windows Movie maker, which is freely available and easy to use and avoids the extra time needed to learn a complex video editing package

The videos were made available through Blackboard 10 days before the field trip. A transcript was also made available to download with key words highlighted and links to items of further reading from the module reading list. 

The outcomes for learners

The students were positive about the videos although some watched them after the fieldtrip. They thought they were useful and about the right length. Half of the students the transcript was useful and half of those who downloaded the transcript mentioned that encouraged them to look at the further reading. Although the readings on the transcript were part of the module reading list it was the prompt from the transcript that got them to looking at the readings. Perhaps it’s a case of a full reading list being too daunting with targeted reading being more useful?

Suggestions from students for future videos are the use of diagrams and animation for further explanation, slightly less repetition of some elements, putting the videos on YouTube and have access to the transcripts in the lectures. Another suggestion was a series of videos outlining what would happen during each day of the field trip

As mentioned earlier the reaction of students was positive as can be seen from the comments below - 

"I thought the videos were very useful and more of them can only be a good thing."

“I think they will be a great resource for students studying the module and geology in general.”

“I thought the videos were really helpful and I wish I would have watched them prior to the trip.”

“I thought they were well done the speech wasn’t too fast but also you can pause the videos to take notes.”

“I don’t know why anyone wouldn’t watch them to be honest.”

“I downloaded them from blackboard. It was easy enough.”

“I think the videos were a good length and contained enough information.”

Further Outcomes.

As process was successful and was generally well received I would use the same approach when making more videos. 

Future possibilities include exploring the use of mobile devices when actually on the field trip, the creation of virtual field trips to even better prepare students for time in the field and getting students to create videos when they are on the field trip.

Two things are key for this. One is that a good script is really important to present the information in a succinct and interesting way. The other is to note that this will not replace the field trip but is designed to support and make the best use of the time when in the field.