Abstract
This chapter explores the project Mediated Geographies: Critical Pedagogy and Geographic Education, which combined the geography departments from the three Universities in Arizona (Northern Arizona State University, Arizona State University, and the University of Arizona). In the pedagogical project we encouraged students to both critically evaluate the vast amount of visual information in their daily lives and become literate in technologies related to digital media. Our four goals were as follows: (1) create a series of integrated geography courses across three universities; (2) have students work in groups on semester-long projects to produce digital video documentaries or multi-media photo essays; (3) use learner-centered education principles combined with critical pedagogy to enhance geographic media literacy within the courses; and (4) have students communicate what they learned to fellow students in a formal, conference setting. Elsewhere, we examine how critical pedagogy and learner-centered education strategies were used to engage students in these projects and how students communicated what they learned in a conference setting (Lukinbeal et al. 2007). In this paper we first review the student documentaries that were created and offer web links to these productions, before turning to our assessment of students’ geographic media literacy skills. We conclude by noting the problems, difficulties, and successes of our project and by making suggestions on how to better assess and implement geographic media literacy skills in pedagogic practice.
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Notes
- 1.
To maintain confidentiality, all students that participated in this project were assigned a number. Responses cited in this paper reference this coding procedure.
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Lukinbeal, C., Finn, J.C., Jones, J.P., Kennedy, C.B., Woodward, K. (2015). Mediated Geographies Across Arizona: Learning Literacy Skills Through Filmmaking. In: Mains, S., Cupples, J., Lukinbeal, C. (eds) Mediated Geographies and Geographies of Media. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9969-0_24
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