Meaningful Learning: Case Studies On The Territorial Identity Of Historical Urban Centres

Abstract

Engaging university students into meaningful learning activities enables critical thinking and understanding (i.e. active learning), instead of memorising knowledge (i.e. passive learning). In this context, we researched the way students at the M.Sc. level learn, at the specialisation of Regional Planning and Development , in the Faculty of Geography, at Babeş-Bolyai University, in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. The aim of the activity was to discover the best means for students to analyse urban cultural landscapes. We offered them plenty of images (i.e. aerial photos) of a series of historical urban centres in Romania (Cluj-Napoca, Brașov, Sibiu, Oradea, Timişoara, Bistriţa) and, while working individually, we asked them to analyse the elements of the city centre and of the urban landscape: the features of the square, its arrangement, the features and the functions of the buildings. Students were also asked to use other sources of images (e.g. Google Earth, Google Maps, etc.) to complete the task, and then they used ArcGIS (a specialised software). In the end, we provided them with an observation protocol that they had to complete with the identified urban elements. We concluded that their in-depth analysis, enabled by an observation protocol, determined students’ in-depth learning of the evolution characteristic of historical urban centres.

Keywords: Urban landscapeimagesArcGISobservation protocolin-depth learningGeography university education

Introduction

Engaging university students into meaningful learning activities encourages critical thinking and understanding. Recent studies support the necessity of greater landscape understanding and the need for Geography university students’ analysing and interpreting landscapes (Dulamă et al., 2016a, 2016b, 2016c; Ilovan et al. 2016; Rose, 2012; Yahner, & Nadenicek, 1997). Within the competence-based and active learning paradigm, to develop students’ higher order thinking (Cook, & Babon, 2017), which the Romanian education system observes, first, we focused our research on the use of images for research and for teaching/learning, and secondly, on using an observation protocol starting from images.

Geographers are interested in making Geography relevant to students (Kalafsky, & Rosko, 2017) and, therefore, they are concerned with a critical pedagogy, combining more theoretical and practical insights (Martin, 2017). In this context, many cities in Romania have historical centres which, due to their territorial identity, host cultural landscapes (Calcatinge, 2013; Ciangă, 2016) and may use this as a resource for sustainable local development (Popa, & Enache, 2016). Thus, it is important to get Geography university students involved into learning activities that enable them understand development and planning for a sustainable future, as well as for landscape understanding and preserving the cultural heritage (Yahner, & Nadenicek, 1997). In addition, raising inhabitants’ and authorities’ awareness about cultural landscapes related to urban culture and architecture (Stan, 2010) helps in diminishing or preventing their neglecting.

Moreover, the impact on and usefulness of the new technology and the use of images on learning in higher education has been approached frequently in the recent decades (Nellis, 2017). For instance, using GIS to assess landscape dynamics also starting from digital sources (e.g. photo archives) (Popa, & Enache, 2016), using geo-tagged photos collected from Flickr and proposing a geo-clustering algorithm (Spyrou et al., 2017), using photographs depicting the urban landscape as a method for social critique (Kim, 2016), using satellite images to monitor and analyse landscape changes (land use and land cover) in coastal areas (Kara et al., 2013, El Banna et al., 2009). In the field of Cultural and Political Geography, research explored the use of propaganda photographs and the promotion of geographical education, while producing nationalist landscapes during the process of nation-building (Tyner et al., 2015), and also explored the use of photos in enabling cultural interaction and understanding (Lemmons et al., 2014).

Problem Statement

People in general, including students, are often superficial observers of cultural urban landscapes (characteristic features, similarities to, differences from other landscapes, and their value). Therefore, in Romania, many historical cultural landscapes were damaged, especially after the 1990s, through the irremediable destruction of the original façades by means of “refurbishment” works or of the new buildings nearby that were different as architectural style, and also because of the low interest in preserving them (because of the owners’ lack of money or education), and now they are too little capitalised (from a touristic perspective, for instance) (Dulamă et al., 2016b; Popa, & Enache, 2016). Moreover, in the Romanian geography education system, people paid little attention to urban landscapes (Dulamă et al., 2016b).

Research Questions

Our research questions were the following: (a) Which are the aspects that the students identify when analysing a historical urban centre? (b) Which are the elements of a historical urban centre that students discover/identify when using specialised software (ArcGIS)? (c) How much does in-depth understanding of the cultural urban landscape increase when guiding students’ analysis with an observation protocol?

Purpose of the Study

Our purpose was to analyse the efficiency of certain materials, of a specialised software (ArcGIS), and of an observation protocol, in comparison with the independent analysis that students realise by themselves on certain cultural urban landscapes (i.e. historical urban centres).

Research Methods

To answer our research questions, we organised a didactic experiment getting involved six students at the M.Sc. level, in their first year of study, at the specialisation of Regional Planning and Development , in the Faculty of Geography, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. They volunteered to be part of this research. We asked our students to analyse the historical centre of a Romanian city they visited. We offered them a list with a selection of cities and each student choose three from the list, in the order he or she preferred. The first author of this paper decided which city was to be analysed by each student. During the first stage, the students received task 1 : Write a text where you analyse the historical urban centre of … (the square and the neighbouring buildings), using the photo we recommended and other photos from the Internet . During the second stage, we received task 2 : Complete the previous text using ArcGIS . During the third stage, they received task 3 : Take pieces of information from the previous text and write them briefly in the table (Table 1 ) . Mark in different colours the texts written during the three stages. Under the table, write the important information that you could not include in it. Mention the other sources you used. Students sent the solved task by e-mail and received the task for the next stage.

At the end of the experiment, they completed a questionnaire, in order to get students’ feedback. Related to the analysis of the historical centres, we asked them to solve the following items: “Which are the strengths/advantages of each stage? Which were your difficulties during each stage? Assign a score from 1 to 5 for each stage, according to how useful you considered the offered materials (photos/software/observation protocol) in order to analyse the historical centre, What are your proposals to enable other students to analyse more easily or better such urban landscapes? and Other comments ...”

During the processing of data, we assigned 1 point for each answer written in every text box from the observation protocol and we realised the sum for each stage. To analyse those squares and the neighbouring buildings, the students did not go in the field (except the one analysing Sibiu).

Findings

Our findings resulted from the analysis of the students’ results after using aerial photos (Stage 1), the software (Stage 2), and the observation protocol (Stage 3).

Conclusion

A complex approach of the reality, using many complementary research tools clarifies knowledge and underlines the limits of each of the respective tools. The aim of this study was to contribute to a competitive educational paradigm in learning Geography, which refuses passive learning. We concluded that the in-depth analysis, enabled by an observation protocol, determined students’ in-depth learning of the evolution characteristic of historical urban centres.

Acknowledgments

We thank the six students at the M.Sc. level, at the specialisation of Regional Planning and Development , in the Faculty of Geography, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, who got involved voluntarily in our didactic experiment and thus made it possible for us to write this paper.

References

• Calcatinge, Al. (2013). Peisajul cultural. Contribuţii la fundamentare teoretică. Sibiu: Editura Universitară Ion Mincu.
• Ciangă, I. Fl. (2016). Peisajul urban în vedutismul transilvan. Cluj-Napoca: Risoprint.
• Cook, B.R. & Babon, A. (2017). Active learning through online quizzes: better learning and less (busy) work. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 41(1), 24-38.
• Dulamă, M.E., Ilovan, O.-R. & Buş, R.-M. (2016a). Cultural landscapes and geography university students’ learning on Facebook discussion groups. In: M. Vlada et al. (eds.), Proceedings of the 11th ICVL (pp. 50-57). Bucharest: Editura Universităţii Bucureşti.
• Dulamă, M.E., Maroşi, Z. & Ilovan, O.-R. (2016b). Chapter 3: Geography university education for the protection and capitalisation of cultural urban landscapes. A case study: the Museum Square, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. In: O.-R. Ilovan & M.E. Dulamă (eds.), Territorial Identity and Values in Geographical Education (pp. 59-118). Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană.
• Dulamă, M.E., Vana, V.-M. & Ilovan, O.-R. (2016c). Assessing territorial planning M.Sc. students using Facebook. In: M. Vlada et al. (eds.), Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Virtual Learning (pp. 66-74). Bucharest: Editura Universităţii Bucureşti.
• El Banna, M.M. & Frihy, O.E. (2009). Natural and anthropogenic influences in the north eastern coast of the Nile Delta, Egypt. Environmental Geology, 57(7), 1593-1602.
• Ilovan, O.-R., Doroftei, I., Buş, R.-M. & Kosinszki, S.-A. (2016). Chapter 1: Territorial identity, cultural landscapes and values education. A brief approach. In: O.-R. Ilovan & M.E. Dulamă (eds.), Territorial Identity and Values in Geographical Education (pp. 13-30). Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană.
• Kalafsky, R.V. & Rosko, H.M. (2017). Applying geography course projects to issues in city resilience and global connectivity. Journal of Geography, 116(2), 67-78.
• Kara, B., Esbah, H. & Deniz, B. (2013). Monitoring and analyzing land use/land cover changes in a developing coastal town: a case study of Kusadasi, Turkey. Journal of Coastal Research, 29(6), 1361-1372.
• Kim, G. (2016). Paper, photography, and a reflection on urban landscape in 1960s Japan. Visual Resources, 32(3-4), 230-246.
• Lemmons, K.K., Brannstrom, C. & Hurd, D. (2014). Exposing students to repeat photography: increasing cultural understanding on a short-term study abroad. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 38(1), 86-105.
• Martin, G. (2017). Scaling critical pedagogy in higher education. Critical Studies in Education, 58(1), 1-18.
• Nellis, M.D. (2017). Transitions in US higher education: implications for geography learning. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 41(2), 155-165.
• Popa, A. & Enache, C. (2016). Urban landscape history revealed by digital sources. In: A. Sandu et al. (eds.), New Approaches in Social and Humanistic Sciences (pp. 423-427). Bologna: Medimond.
• Rose, G. (2012). Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to Researching with Visual Materials. Sage.
• Spyrou, E., Korakakis, M., Charalampidis, V., Psallas, A. & Mylonas, P. (2017). A geo-clustering approach for the detection of areas-of-interest and their underlying semantics. Algorithms, 10(1), Article 35.
• Stan, A. (2010). Cultură urbană – peisaj cultural urban. Urbanism. Arhitectură. Construcţii, 1(1), 19-24.
• Tyner, J., Kimsroy, S. & Sirik, S. (2015). Landscape photography, geographic education, and nation-building in Democratic Kampuchea, 1975-1979. Geographical Review, 105(4), 566-580.
• Yahner, T.G. & Nadenicek, D.J. (1997). Community by design: Contemporary problems historic resolve. Landscape and Urban Planning, 39(2-3), 137-151.