Ancient Cities. Creating a Digital Learning Environment on Cultural Heritage Erasmus Project

Project Title

Ancient Cities. Creating a Digital Learning Environment on Cultural Heritage

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Creativity and culture; Open and distance learning; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

The humanities in general and Classics or Classical Archaeology in particular are in need for testing, promoting and implementing high quality digital learning material in their respective fields both for teaching at university and school level as well as for reaching out to a broader audience. The SP “Ancient Cities” aimed at creating digital learning materials for different audiences. The project focused on the ancient city, as this topic is a central subject in the education of students of archaeology, history and art history. The partners developed learning materials for a pan-European digital learning module for use at universities and have created the freely available Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) “Discovering Greek & Roman Cities” for a broad audience. The guiding question was: How can digital teaching be implemented in the historical humanities and how can digitization appeal to different target groups?

The learning material comprises 34 educational videos (on the topics of “Basics”, “Life in the Ancient City”, “Religion and the Ancient City”, “Politics and the Ancient City”, “Death and the Ancient City”, “Infrastructure and the Ancient City”, “Economy and the Ancient City” and “The Heritage of the Ancient City”) of up to 10 minutes in length as well as extensive digital learning material in the form of texts, maps, assignments, quizzes and bibliographies. The learning material is available in English, German and French; the literature lists are tailored to the respective languages. The teaching videos have English, German, French, Greek and Turkish (25 videos) subtitles.
The production of the textual learning material was based on the scholarship of dialogue-based learning, a theory with strong historical roots in scholarship on learning and dissemination. Dialogue-based learning is increasingly being used in Scandinavian educational institutions, but also in museums of art and archaeology. It is based on the theory that meaning and learning is developed through dialogue between both students and teachers
The videos were either shot on-site or in modern cities depending on the video’s topic, learning goals as well as general financial and administrative possibilities and restrictions. On the one side we wanted to give viewers first-hand information on archaeological sites and interview specialists. On the other side we aimed at connecting ancient and modern cities by recording the videos in a contemporary environment.

The MOOC “Discovering Greek & Roman Cities” was aimed at a broad audience: people interested in archaeology, art and cultural history, architecture and history. The participation did not require any previous knowledge. The course was accessible online free of charge and had two runs: in fall 2019 and in spring 2020 during the COVID lockdown. Course materials were multilingual and available in German, English and French.
The course started with a welcome section to familiarise the learners with the platform so that they can make better use of this form of online learning they might not be accustomed to. The course was divided into eight modules, each of which centres on a key aspect of ancient urbanism. The modules were released consecutively every week. After an introduction, life, religion, politics, death, infrastructure and the economy of ancient cities were discussed. The final module focused on the legacy of ancient cities and the role of ancient heritage in our cities today.
The topics were chosen so as to provide an overview of the multivalent character of ancient Greek and Roman cities and the ways in which we study them today. As the project partners wanted students to get exposure to first-hand knowledge of the subject matter, the expertise of the MOOC’s partners was a defining factor in planning the modules. However, important topics – such as race and gender – were not addressed in depth. Such topics were tackled in synchronous meetings and online discussions when the modules were implemented in University courses.
The aim of the MOOC “Discovering Greek & Roman Cities” was not only to communicate knowledge about the layout and function of ancient cities and their historical development, but also to spark interest in and to stimulate the discussion of the (ancient) cultural heritage in one’s own city.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 358845,7 Eur

Project Coordinator

CHRISTIAN-ALBRECHTS-UNIVERSITAET ZU KIEL & Country: DE

Project Partners

• ETHNIKO KAI KAPODISTRIAKO PANEPISTIMIO ATHINON
• THE UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM
• OPEN UNIVERSITEIT NEDERLAND
• AARHUS UNIVERSITET
• UNIVERSITETET I BERGEN
• UNIVERSITE PARIS I PANTHEON-SORBONNE