What I did on my holidays: digital fieldtrips and digital literacies

Abstract

If a picture says a thousand words, how much can a 360° image say? How can experiencing (or understanding) other languages and cultures be conveyed in immersive experiences? The Digital Learning Team at the University of Southampton has been developing innovative resources whilst piloting the use of Thinglink, a subscriptionand browser-based software which allows educators and students to create interactive 360° tours embedded with rich media tags and online forms. As mentioned in Fielding and Peel (2017), “[u]sually it takes months of training to develop a virtual world but Thinglink allows this to be done in a short space of time by users with no previous experience” (n.p.). Students could develop digital literacies and skills by creating immersive narratives of their experiences beyond the university environment. In exploring one easy to apply production process, we are at an early stage of innovative practice which has applications for many disciplines. This report outlines aspects of our production process and gives top tips for designing for 360° resources.