Rome Wasn't Digitized in a Day - Council on Library and Information ...

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also declared that the m<strong>in</strong>imal f<strong>in</strong>ancial cost <strong>in</strong>volved <strong>in</strong> develop<strong>in</strong>g Galactica illustrated that “new
technology can be used cost-effectively for very traditional purposes as well as for radically new
ones.” The ma<strong>in</strong> benefit of Galactica, he concluded, would be if it helped free up class time <strong>in</strong> a costeffective
way. The efficiency of technology was thus recognized by both Ashdowne and Vlachopoulos
as an important means of conv<strong>in</strong>c<strong>in</strong>g traditional scholars to adopt a new tool.
One ambitious effort <strong>in</strong> the United K<strong>in</strong>gdom to encourage classicists not just to utilize digital resources
with<strong>in</strong> the classroom but also to actively participate <strong>in</strong> their design has been described by OKell et al.
(2010). Between 2006 and 2008, the HCA 635 and the Centre for Excellence <strong>in</strong> Teach<strong>in</strong>g and Learn<strong>in</strong>g
for Reusable Learn<strong>in</strong>g Objects (RLO-CETL) 636 collaborated to create a reusable learn<strong>in</strong>g object. Their
project “digitally modeled the sem<strong>in</strong>ar (as a typical <strong>in</strong>stance of humanities pedagogy) <strong>in</strong> a generic form
<strong>in</strong>side a software package” and created the Generative Learn<strong>in</strong>g Object (GLO) Maker software 637 that
could be used by faculty <strong>in</strong> their teach<strong>in</strong>g. As OKell et al. expla<strong>in</strong>ed, the RLO-CETL participated <strong>in</strong>
this process because they wanted to “elicit pedagogical patterns” from various discipl<strong>in</strong>es and then
digitally model these patterns <strong>in</strong> ways that could be utilized by teach<strong>in</strong>g practitioners. The RLO-CETL
particularly wanted to ensure that the design process was “practitioner led” and that their doma<strong>in</strong>
expertise was recognized. The HCA participated <strong>in</strong> this collaboration out of a desire to engage with the
e-learn<strong>in</strong>g community and to create e-resources that would be appropriate for their discipl<strong>in</strong>ary
community. This collaboration illustrates the importance of doma<strong>in</strong> specialists and technologists
work<strong>in</strong>g together as well as the need to recognize doma<strong>in</strong> expertise <strong>in</strong> the design of discipl<strong>in</strong>arily
appropriate learn<strong>in</strong>g objects.
One key issue that the project wished to address was the need for students to engage <strong>in</strong> more critical
learn<strong>in</strong>g. They cited surveys where university students expressed frustration at not be<strong>in</strong>g taught how to
read texts and at lectures not giv<strong>in</strong>g them the “right answer.” The project thus decided to focus on
creat<strong>in</strong>g a learn<strong>in</strong>g object that supported students <strong>in</strong> learn<strong>in</strong>g to look at evidence and vary<strong>in</strong>g
<strong>in</strong>terpretations of that evidence, and to then make a critical argument of their own. The HCA brought a
number of <strong>in</strong>sights to this work from a JISC-funded scop<strong>in</strong>g survey they had conducted (MacMahon
2006) to determ<strong>in</strong>e the use of e-resources <strong>in</strong> teach<strong>in</strong>g and learn<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong> the U.K. <strong>in</strong> history, classics, and
archaeology. This survey illustrated that those faculty who participated supported “the creation of a
community model” both to share their content 638 and to structure the pedagogy of the e-learn<strong>in</strong>g
materials they used. Participants thought that their teach<strong>in</strong>g would benefit from shar<strong>in</strong>g e-learn<strong>in</strong>g
resources with colleagues and they wanted customizable e-resources for particular content and learn<strong>in</strong>g
objectives. At the same time, they did not want to require outside help or to have to acquire new skills
to be able to use e-learn<strong>in</strong>g resources. Similar results <strong>in</strong> terms of a desire not to need to learn any new
skills to use digital resources were reported by Brown and Greengrass (2010) and Warwick et al.
(2008a).
A key research question of the project was to explore if the learn<strong>in</strong>g technology approaches that were
used for scientific discipl<strong>in</strong>es could also be used <strong>in</strong> the humanities. The HCA held a workshop with a
number of academics where they reached the conclusion that the best approach would be to create a
635 http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/hca
636 http://www.rlo-cetl.ac.uk/
637 http://www.glomaker.org/
638 Interest<strong>in</strong>gly, even though respondents overwhelm<strong>in</strong>gly supported the shar<strong>in</strong>g of e-resources, only 42 percent <strong>in</strong>dicated that they were actually shar<strong>in</strong>g
e-resources with colleagues either with<strong>in</strong> or outside of their home <strong>in</strong>stitutions. The major reasons for this were a general lack of knowledge as to what
types of e-resources were be<strong>in</strong>g used by their colleagues, a belief that learn<strong>in</strong>g materials should be “closely tailored” to particular learn<strong>in</strong>g objectives or
course content, worries about ownership of materials, and lack of <strong>in</strong>centives to share. Personal contacts by far led to the most shar<strong>in</strong>g of resources.
Although there was some support for the creation of a repository or website to collect and make such e-resources searchable, there were great concerns
about the susta<strong>in</strong>ability of such a repository.