PEDAGOGICAL OBJECTIVE
Compiling and presenting research on a digital platform allows students to showcase their findings to each other, and to incorporate resources and links from the wider web. Using visualization and analysis of spatial patterns in party affiliation of voters was a crucial strategy for this particular topic. Students were encouraged to adopt a research mindset through deep exploration of the topic of gerrymandering.
ACADEMIC TECHNOLOGY TOOL
Wordpress is a platform, hosted by Amherst, to create blogs for courses and academic projects.
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Tanya Leise
Description
In the Fall 2018 course Math 150: Voting and Elections: A Mathematical Perspective, Professor Tanya Leise had students work in groups to research the mathematics of gerrymandering in the United States and other countries, including consideration of the historical and political context. Students then developed sections of a class website to display and visualize their research and findings.
The responsibility for creating each section of the website that other students (and not just the professor) would see was effective in motivating the groups to provide complete, accurate information on their topic, with attractive visualizations. The topics to be covered in the website were determined by the whole class, then students ranked which they would prefer to work on. Groups were assigned based on those preferences, and the collaborative process appeared quite productive. Within each group, students generated lots of ideas, divvied up tasks, and provided helpful feedback to each other as they assembled their section. They learned far more about gerrymandering and how to measure it than if the material were disseminated via lecture or individual projects. A future improvement will be to build in more time for constructive feedback from the class as a whole to each group to polish and refine the sections, double check correctness, and create a more even look and organization across the website.
Students added a wealth of links, images, videos, etc to support their research and explanations. This site will prove a valuable learning resource for future iterations of the class as well, both to learn about gerrymandering and to continue developing the website itself to include new political and mathematical developments.
ATS provided assistance in creating the original site and training the students and professor in how to develop it. Creating the website content went smoothly for students, allowing them to develop their ideas freely.
The Center for Community Engagement provided assistance to the course through connecting the instructor with outside experts in voting and elections, who visited the class at different points throughout the semester.
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Published Spring 2020 by Academic Technology Services