Digital Creation

In My Research, Teaching, and Public History

I have experience as a creator of digital history for teaching purposes, for research purposes, and for public history projects.

Created digital sources

  • from born-analogue documents

  • as born-digital audio podcast

  • as in-class, hybrid, and remote learning digital history units

Digitizing 200-year old Documents on a Research Trip to a Boston Archive

To make the best of my time on a research trip to the Massachusetts Historical Society, I digitized dozens of letters, account books, and diaries of merchants and founders of the Lowell mills (creating about 300 slides). It is a difficult project that must be done well in order to be useful, to avoid mixing documents (most of which could not be digitized in a single photo), to be viewable. Over the days I was there, my technique improved, but there is still room for improvement.

Short Podcasts and Films for Teaching

  • Created born digital audio content for Websites and Course Management Systems

  • Short podcasts to introduce a topic, document or assignment

  • Works particularly well for hybrid, online, independent learning, or flip-the-classroom pedagogies

Sample introduction to a document, which I made quickly and easily for an online Women's History course.

Dr Mo Spinning Lowell, part 1.

A clip of a reading from my manuscript.

A sample of a short podcast/video of mine for use in a course or for teaching about podcasts.

  • This one is clearly flawed, and can be analyzed for improvement.

  • Dr Mo Spinning Lowell, part 2

Created digital sources from born analogue documents

  • digitized primary source documents (such as letters, posters, photographs, newspapers, etc.)

  • created audio from analogue sources

Sample:

Letter to an Army Buddy, 1957

  • I digitized a collection of private papers for uses in teaching

Sample:

The Mill Girls Hit the Beach, c.1912

  • I digitized a collection of private photographs for teaching and research

Non-linear slide presentations as independent learning units/modules

  • PowerPoint and Prezi both have non-linear formats that are useful for in-class presentation/discussion and for remote and independent learning units (some learning systems have their own technology to prepare learning modules).

  • Non-linear digital representation is ideal for use as self-learning units to which I add audio narration

  • This format allows me to move seamlessly between in-class pedagogy, outside learning, hybrid learning, flip-the classroom techniques, and remote online learning.


The Working City Oral History Project

The Working City Oral History Project is a project I created, receiving a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, to interview people in Lowell, Massachusetts from various work backgrounds about how they managed during the city's prolonged economic depression.

  • I attended Columbia University's Oral History Institute.

  • Trained under award-winning labor and oral historian and radio broadcast producer, Charles Hardy.

  • Learned to create archival, broadcast-quality digital interviews and digital editing at a time when the technology and software were new and still difficult to use.

  • Ironically, this older digital technology is not easily accessible today.

  • 1993-96