Preface

The #DLFTeach Toolkit Volume 3 builds upon the previous toolkits and has literacies and competencies as its particular lens. Through structured lesson plans and contextual material, the contributors demonstrate how engaging in digital scholarship and digital humanities work leads to developing literacies such as the ones found in the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy. The editors encouraged authors to go beyond this framework to seek intersections with other literacies, such as visual literacy, data literacy, primary source literacy, and the like. The toolkit also addresses a range of digital competencies, from metadata creation to network file management. Competencies are the foundational digital skills that provide both a practical and critical understanding of digital technologies. As you will see, most of the lessons engaged with the Bryn Mawr Digital Competencies, a framework designed to help undergraduate students build and reflect on higher-level digital skills, such as Digital Communication or Data Analysis and Presentation. We chose to focus on literacies and competencies because we know from experience that making them a significant component of DS/DH lesson design increases learning outcomes. We also chose to focus on them because the transferable knowledge students gain from literacy and competency driven lessons will not only serve them in their other coursework but empower them with critical skills beyond graduation.  

Toolkit Overview

The nine lessons in this volume cover foundational digital tools like Voyant and Omeka and newer ones such as Transkribus and the International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF). Most lessons focus on the act of making and engaging with tools, while others address misinformation and algorithmic bias. The structure and length of the lessons vary considerably, with some designed for standalone sessions and others spanning the duration of a course.

In “Building Online Exhibits,” Suzan Alteri presents the process of developing a digital exhibit for either Omeka or WordPress. In four modules, students build skills in visual and primary source literacies as they create an exhibit for an English class. Miranda Marraccini and Adela Pinch share a lesson on conducting text analysis in a single session in “Gentle Introduction to Text Analysis with Voyant.” In “Data Literacy with Network Analyses,” Hillary Richardson and Russell Brandon take students from a set of archival letters to a network visualization through a set of flipped classroom style modules. This lesson focuses on the data creation and cleanup inherent in network analysis and digital competencies. “Creating Digital Stories with TimelineJS” by Kayla Abner et al. goes beyond “buttonology” to cover topics like copyright and digital storytelling. In “Exploring Storytelling Through the Digital with ArcGIS StoryMaps,” Victoria Longfield covers the mechanics of Esri’s ArcGIS StoryMaps while also providing training on finding media in the public domain or applying fair use principles. Hillary Richardson and Elaine Walker highlight the intersections of primary source literacy with digital competencies while using the platform Transkribus in their lesson, “Preparing Letters as Data: Transcribing Archival Documents.” Christopher Gilman and his collaborators contributed a semester-long lesson plan that shows how to integrate IIIF-ready digital collections with course management software with a focus on the proficiency of annotation in “IIInteroperable Activities.” For those looking for ideas teaching around algorithms and algorithmic bias, Andrea Baer’s lesson, “Algorithmic Awareness, Algorithmic Bias, and Social Justice” is an adaptable lesson for a wide range of contexts. Finally, Ashley Peterson and Alexandra Solodkaya tackle scientific misinformation in a lesson designed for upper-level natural sciences students in “Exploring the Causes of Scientific Misinformation.”

Toolkit Structure

For this volume, the types of information provided–such as that which is found in the sections “Curricular Context,” “Adaptability,” and “Preparation–mirror previous toolkits. Additionally, we included “Implementation Fidelity,” a new section intended to bring to light how authors might assess the implementation of the lesson itself, not just student learning of concepts and skills. We felt this level of examination was needed as DS/DH undergraduate and graduate credentialing takes place more and more, necessitating program-level assessment.

We have allowed our contributors flexibility in the way they have structured their materials, but all lessons include the following sections:

• Summary

• Literacies & Competencies

• Audience

• Curricular Context

• Instructional Partners

• Technology

• Adaptability

• Learning Outcomes

• Preparation

• Materials

• Assessment, including Student Learning and Implementation Fidelity

• Reflection

• Lesson Outline

• Additional Materials/Appendices

Licensing

Under the terms of the Creative Commons license adapted for each contribution (CC BY or CC BY-NC 4.0) you are free to share, adapt, remix, and transform the material contained here. Please give proper attribution and credit for reuse. Please also share your iterations with the wider #DLFTeach community on Twitter using the #DLFTeach hashtag. You can find us on Twitter and in-person at the annual DLF Forum for workshops and community-building.

Editors

Managing Editors

Mackenzie Brooks and Melanie Hubbard

Editorial Team

• Jennifer Hootman

• Alex Wermer-Colan

Peer Reviewers

• Kayla Abner

• Suzan Alteri

• Hilary Baribeau

• Mackenzie Brooks

• Melanie Hubbard

• Natalia Kapacinskas

• Amanda Koziura

• Victoria Longfield

• Alex Wermer-Colan

• Nicole Wilson

• Heidi Winkler

Acknowledgments

The editors would like to thank the authors, editorial team, and peer reviewers who made this toolkit possible. Your knowledge, skills, and dedication to creating a quality resource are invaluable. In addition, we would like to thank our fellow editors and contributors to Exploring Literacies: A dh+lib Special Issue for the process of creating that issue, and the many conversations around literacies it inspired, led to this toolkit. Finally, we want to thank the Digital Library Federation for providing a venue to conduct and share this work. In particular, we greatly appreciate the support provided by #DLFTeach co-facilitators Heidi Winkler, Alex Wermer-Colan, and Hillary Richardson.