Until now, all the virtual field trips on VR Glaciers have been self-guided. That is, they are provided without interpretation. I have taken this approach because it provides the flexibility for the same virtual field trip to be used in different ways. During the pandemic, for example, I heard how the Arolla virtual field trip had been used as a basis for a range of ecology, geomorphology, and glaciology exercises, from school through to postgraduate level. For this approach to work, educators need to have the time, expertise and confidence to develop learning activities for their students.
For several years now, I have also heard from our PGCE (teacher training) students at Worcester that it would be really helpful if I could develop guided virtual field trips. I could certainly see the benefits. Teachers are incredibly short of time and they do not always have the subject grounding and confidence to develop bespoke teaching resources for glaciated environments. Although I have shared worksheets with teachers, it has become clear to me that these probably work best when integrated with the virtual field trip.
The revised Cwm Idwal virtual field trip, which remains a work in progress, includes embedded questions and tasks. To avoid a passive experience, some prior knowledge is assumed. Rather than focus on seemingly abstract concepts, such as how ice flows around obstacles at the bed, the emphasis here is on landform and landscape interpretation. In addition to a short introductory video at the start, there are multiple questions (multiple choice and short answer) which are marked automatically (using Google Forms). This allows students to receive timely feedback as they progress through the virtual field trip. There are also some field sketching tasks, although these cannot be automatically graded and instead must be shown to the teacher or lecturer.
Please feel free to provide feedback and requests for additions (or changes). I will probably add a few videos, and I will definitely add a ‘further reading’ resource in due course.
