I have several ideas about the final project for this course but they are a bit “outside the box.” I understand that the goal is to create a student web-based project with learning opportunities and goals for students and stated desired outcomes.
Creating an individual project based on a topic or unit for a class I teach would be fine, but I’ve been recently named coordinator for a Digital Humanities initiative at Harpeth Hall School (my day job in addition to one adjunct class per semester at Belmont). One of my tasks for the summer is to work with two teacher groups to design projects that incorporate DH methods and online tools. I am working with a 1) Latin teacher and 2) a larger group that includes all junior-level English and history teachers. Aside from my DH goals, I am also a junior-level AP US history teacher giving me a dual role in that group whereby I would be creating a project for a class I teach. Another goal for my DH coordinator summer work is to design a digital infrastructure where these and other projects can be hosted as part of a larger digital portfolio. The goal is to produce something along the lines of the LEADR lab at Michigan State University: http://leadr.msu.edu/projects/.
For this class I would love to work on these two separate but connected projects. I recognize that this would change the typical questions and important historical issues that the HIST689 project is designed to spark, but I am hoping that with Dr. Kelly’s approval I can find a way to approach the project requirements with a little creative license. There are still difficult questions and issues for students to make sense of– just not necessarily and solely tied to history or a course that I teach. My goal would be more along the lines of Lévesque’s argument to move (or combine) substantive content with procedural content using practices, tools, skills and methods related to DH.
