Unlocking Squareland Mysteries: The Development of Squareland Digital Field Trips led by Kara Haas

At the Kellogg Biological Station (KBS), MSU’s largest off-campus research and education complex, in-person field trips have been a mainstay of outreach efforts since the 1920s. Field trips are memorable learning experiences that connect students physically and emotionally with the local environment. Unfortunately, these in-person events are becoming less common in K-12 American schools, due to budget constraints, focus on standardized test performance and the COVID-19 pandemic (Behrendt & Franklin, 2014; Greene et al., 2014). In light of these constraints, teachers have been using schoolyards and near-school natural areas as field trip destinations. These near-school nature and community experiences should be encouraged. These local experiences could be paired with digital humanities (DH) tools and pedagogy (May, 2000) to provide the opportunity to deepen the context globally. When used together, local and digital experiences can support students in connecting their lived experience and local places with global issues such as climate change and agroecological systems. Digital experiences make possible travel to new places by removing barriers of cost and geographical distance to create more equitable opportunities for marginalized communities.

With the DH Seed Grant, allowed the opportunity to think more creatively and expansively about how K-12 students engage with the landscapes, people and stories of KBS.

The following Project Highlight was originally created for the DH@MSU Undergraduate Newsletter and was featured in the March 29, 2023 issue. Subscribe to the Newsletter here.