Talking About Teaching Workshop 17-18/10 SUPER LA Days Alnarp

WS 1: PROGRESSION OF DIGITAL TOOLS WITHIN OUR LANDSCAPE PROGRAMS - WHAT DO  WE DO? HOW CAN IT BE DEVELOPED?

Participants: Tomas Eriksson (Sol), Maria Wisselgren (Sol), Anna Robling (Sol), Andrea Conti (Sol), Anders Westin (Lapf), Kristin Wegren (Lapf), Eva Kristensson (Lapf)

Summary: Analog remains important but we need to be aware of what´s happening in the field. Ultuna and Alnarp are similar when it comes to CAD/Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign. Neither offer courses in GIS specific software, which is integrated in LA‐courses. Alnarp offers GIS, in a year two “planning course”. Ultuna has not had much GIS in the three first years, but in the new curricular layout students will get an introduction in the third year . Alnarp and Ultuna offer a master level “GIS course”. Alnarp has a course in digital visualization. Alnarp has produced literature/texts about e.g CAD (Ultuna has no literature). Alnarp has a digital coordinator (Anders Westin) who has worked with a digital strategy for 15 years.

Suggestions for knowledge sharing/capacity building

1. Ultuna can use literature from Alnarp – CAD, Digital “image-making”. 
2. Recorded lectures are a possibility.

Next steps/to do:

1. Create crash courses for teachers. Virtual reality. 3D‐tools, Sketchup, Rhino?
2. Explore the possibility of using drones for future inventory of landscapes etc.?
3. Start an investigation about what we do today, what will we do in the future, what´s happening in the field. We need to know what to prioritize.
4. Look into 3-D printing equipment. In Ultuna we got a question from students about buying a 3D‐printer. That started a simple investigation about these issues, but it could be extended.

WS 2: PROGRESSION OF WRITING WITHIN OUR LANDSCAPE PROGRAMS - WHAT DO WE DO?  HOW CAN IT BE DEVELOPED?

Participants: Åsa Bensch (Lapf), Caroline Hägerhäll (AEM), Marie Larsson (Lapf), Paola Ledo (Sol), Daniel Valentini (Sol), Burcu Yigit Turan (Sol), Ida Maria Ågren (Sol), Johan Pries (Sol)

Summary: We all agreed upon that progression of writing skills is the visible outcome of the progression of thinking. To develop thinking requires time for reflection, which our students (like us) probably calculate too little time for. To write academic texts you also have to think analytically, a skill required within the profession when solving complex problems. 

The group discussed different, concrete ways to develop the analytical and critical thinking that also would improve academic writing. Lectures, workshops and maybe even shorter courses in methodologies, statistics, design theory and critical writing on both undergraduate and graduate level were suggested. We also agreed upon that there should be more variety of writing assignments during the education, focusing on different audiences and stakeholders for the texts produced. We very seldom discuss popular scientific texts, which most of our students likely will produce more of, in future, than academic texts.

WS 3: ORAL FEEDBACK WITHIN OUR EDUCATION AT OUR LANDSCAPE PROGRAMS – HOW DOES IT WORK? HOW CAN IT BE DEVELOPED?

Participants: Marina Queiroz (Sol), Maria Kylin (Lapf), Anna Peterson (Lapf), Arne Nordius (Lapf)

Summary: We had very interesting discussions about the pedagogical method of “the critic”; when students orally present work to teachers and/or professionals from the trade (landscape architects) for feedback (kritik in Swedish). We discussed materials and methods we use in our teaching, shared situations and incidents that have arisen in our own practice, and we talked about norms, discrimination and equal opportunities issues.

After the workshop, we shared materials used in our teaching (i.e. Marina shared lectures about group work and group process, oral presentation, the critic, norms and critical thinking, and protocols used for peer evaluation by the students). We will continue the discussions informally, amongst ourselves also with our colleagues at our respective campuses.

SUGGESTIONS for April 2019 workshop themes (Landscape Days 24-25 April 2019, Ultuna):

Norms: how do we handle the discussion on norms? How do we promote and teach norm-critical thinking? How do we deal with polarization (i.e. if a student displays discriminating ideas in a proposal)?

-Concrete ways to improve the writing progression? New courses? Mandatory teaching in design theory, statistics and methodologies within already existing courses? Should teachers who examine and tutor thesis work upgrade their skills and awareness concerning different type of writing?

- Follow up themes from past LA‐days.