JISC

Start date: 2 January 2003

End date: 31 December 2004

Funding programme: Exchange for Learning (X4L) programme

Project website: http://www.warwick.ac.uk/ETS/ARCHES/

JISC theme(s): e-Learning

Introduction

Over two years, ARCHES will imaginatively re-purpose an exciting range of materials on ancient Greece and Rome between three educational contexts (FE, HE, and an Independent Online Resource), three subject areas (Theatre Studies, Classics, VR Modelling) and seven modules. Using a variety of delivery modes in modules over a range of learning levels in FE and HE and beyond, creative use of these resources will transform aspects of traditional pedagogy and introduce innovative pedagogical practices. 

The partners will also increase the range and number of accessible online resources by contributing a substantial new collection of Virtual Reality objects relating to Greece and Rome prepared by the University of Warwick in the course of five years of publicly funded work. These objects will be of immense value to disciplines such as Classics, the Performing Arts, Art History, Architecture, IT Modelling, and others. No other VR objects of such high quality or pedagogical value currently freely exist in the public domain. Moreover, enabled by a number of recent grants from the University of Warwick, project members in Classics and Theatre Studies have created a collection of 1,500 original digital images of Roman artefacts. Through this project, these two collections will become freely available to FE, HE and international educational sectors for the first time. 

The project builds on this expertise and collaboration as well as innovative developments undertaken through previous HEFCE and European projects. There are strong connections in terms of interoperability and the development of metadata and taxonomies from the RESULTs Network (DNER 5/99) portal project, which has developed collaborative relationships with a number of JISC and LTSN bodies.

Aims and Objectives

Aims  

ARCHES aims to support and link institutions, departments, courses and modules as they introduce, evaluate and disseminate exemplary, transformative and innovative pedagogy through re-purposing new and existing collections of digital resources pertaining to ancient Greece and Rome.  

Objectives

1. Collating and cataloguing electronic resources within an appropriate metadata scheme
2. Creating an online database that tutors and students can both search and browse, and which will seamlessly deliver resources to technically- and educationally-diverse environments
3. Exploring ways in which the resources can be re-purposed for a variety of contexts and modes of delivery, and integrated in exemplary fashion into actual teaching practice
4. Implementing and evaluating the effectiveness of the pedagogical and technological approaches
5. Systematically documenting and reflecting on these processes in each learning context and extract outcomes that have value for and impact on HE and FE sectors as a whole
6. Incorporating in the collection descriptions of effective learning interactions and user experiences
7. Disseminating project resources and outcomes through generic and subject-specific channels.

This project has now ended. The final report and evaluation report are appended to this page as WORD documents.