21st Century Fieldwork Nick Lapthorn Head of Centre – Juniper Hall Field Centre nick.jh@field-studies-council.org

A new dawn? (or just the same old stuff) GIS and NEW TECHNOLOGIES Qualitative Quantitative Primary Secondary RESEARCH

20th Century Fieldwork? STYLES 21st Century Fieldwork? LOCATIONS

Examples of types of new fieldwork Studentification Clone towns Sustainable transport Eco/carbon footprints Use and miss-use of green spaces Re-branding the 24hr city Stakeholder views Energy audits Right to roam Place checklists Mobility pathways Food miles Activity patterns Exciting new opportunities Weather-watch Exclusion by gender / age Lifestyle analysis Catchment management Shoreline management Impression maps Sustainable communities Ecological value Think maps Flood-risk determination Roof hydrographs Tourism profiles Place profiles

How to make the most of the new changes? Less need to measure in minute detail. Holistic and topical studies. Greater opportunity for ‘qualitative’ approaches. Greater relevance of topics to everyday situations.

Becoming a geographical researcher Find data Select and Sort Synthesise and Analyse Record and Report

Books – including standard A’Level texts Lots of choice

Articles – the ‘big 6’ Range of articles newspapers GeoFile online Guardian & Independent Range of articles newspapers GeoFactsheet GeoNews Review Geographical ‘dossier’ Geography Review

Remember to use their websites Further Journals Remember to use their websites

Getting additional help Try the exam boards

The World Wide Web

Probably the best geography websites - CENSUS

Probably the best geography websites: Fieldwork - OTHERS Google Books Search http://books.google.com/ Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/

Blogs and forums (also newspapers / editorials)

‘Miro’ – video search and saving software (freeware)

On the web…always consider Who published the information Organisation/Agency/Individual Who wrote the information Expert or interested individual? The age of the material Why the material exists Academic research/Special interest groups

Web evaluation checklist?

  Library vs internet Library Internet Has helpful staff to help you find things. Organised! Provides free access to print and paper copies of items, e.g. journals Archived information available Doesn’t always have what you want Not always up to date copies Closes after hours Cant always take out reference copies Nearly all in written form Internet Open all hours Provides access to global resources, e.g. newspaper from India Complete multimedia experience Updated information Two way communication No universal system of cataloguing and organising resources Anyone can publish things May have to pay for internet time May have to pay for some resources

Exploring Ethnographic Opportunity A picture tells a 1000 words? All about participant observation: “people writing”

Ethnographic fieldwork Oral Histories Direct participant observation (movements and flows) – covert or overt? Focus groups Personal video (extended) interviews Diary of an event, e.g. city food festival Keep personal observations in a field note book / diary

Imagery Price Prediction: High – Med – Low Actual Average Price (approx): £___________

Imagery Price Prediction: High – Med – Low Actual Average Price (approx): £___________

Denotation-Connotation Annotation-Implication Gold lettering in TNR, British Racing green Sophisticated, high quality, traditional The denotation of this example is a red rose with a green stem. The connotation is that it is a symbol of passion and love - this is what the rose represents. What if all the shops in the street were like this? Who would(n’t) come? Curved facade to allow more display space

Article in Geography Review: March 2007 What is GIS ? “GIS has the ability to store, retrieve, manipulate and analyse a range of spatially related data” The user can: ask questions of data related to the map search for patterns and distributions investigate the underlying relationships between different sets of data Article in Geography Review: March 2007 Definition of what GIS is – rememebr it means different things to different people.

Potential benefits of GIS Spatial Understanding Enquiry learning Identifying relationships Vocational element Motivation

Continuums FREE EXPENSIVE EASY TO USE COMPLICATED BASIC SOPHISTICATED Often web based EASY TO USE COMPLICATED BASIC SOPHISTICATED Sometimes a ‘cut-down’ version

Progression in GIS DIGITAL MAPPING (eg. Anquet, Memory Map) MAPPING LAYERS (eg Magic, Census, Google Earth) INTEROGATIVE GIS (eg Aegis, ArcInfo)

Rand of GIS software – on the spectrum

Google Local Free, web-based GIS (very simple). Some limited interrogation of underlying data, i.e. location details of banks in Shrewsbury (can be asked).

More from Google Maps Becoming more sophisticated, now 3D virtual ‘immersions’, but still not true GIS, i.e. cannot ‘see’ the database which underlies this.

Google maps - manipulation Google maps can be manipulated to show fieldwork surveys – you have to be logged in to use this feature

Explore geo-tagged photos on a map - Flickr Flickr.com to view geo-tagged photos, i.e. images that are spatially referenced. Can give you an idea about ‘place’ and ‘image’. Students can upload their own images; also way of enhancing pre-and post fieldwork value.

Panoramio Another example of a geo-tagged viewed

Screen shot from Google Erath Screen shot from Google Erath. Resolution is improving all the time for remote areas. Can manipulate through use of own overlays.

Environment Agency

High end – ARC GIS Very powerful, but potentially complex to use. Paid-for, expensive site licence for a school. Training required to use product. Would be difficult to get students engaged in such a complex piece of software.

Other sources GA GTIP Page http://www.geography.org.uk/projects/gtip/gis/ http://www.geography.org.uk/projects/gtip/thinkpieces/gis GA GIS section

Other sources RGS GIS Page www.gis.rgs.org RGS GIS pages

Ordnance Survey Other useful resources from the OS education team

GIS WWW Topic/Content Research

A new dawn?

nick.jh@field-studies-council.org