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Teaching and Learning Resources

Browse teaching and learning resources useful for graduate and teaching assistants.

The Department of Art History and Archaeology is committed to excellence in undergraduate and graduate education.

The resources below are provided to support teaching and learning. Instructors in the department should also take advantage of UMD’s Teaching and Learning Transformation Center, which offers support for all aspects of instruction including course development, instructional planning, educational technologies and professional development.

Resources

Resources for Graduate Students

The way we delve into research or interpret ideas is constantly changing in the digital age.  Below you will find a short list of helpful sites to assist in efforts to re-imagine the context of an artwork, acquire high quality images, and explore new research and teaching techniques.

  • ARTstor: Funded by the Mellon foundation, ARTstor’s mission is to “use digital technology to enhance scholarship, teaching, and learning in the arts and associated fields.” Since its development in the late 1990s, ARTstor’s database has grown to over 1.5 million digital images.  Its collections cover a wide range of subject areas, from an archive of Islamic textiles to twenty years of contemporary New York gallery shows.
  • CAA: Founded in 1911, the College Art Association provides numerous resources and opportunities for its members and participants.  A year-long membership for students is $55 (as of June 13, 2013).
  • Dropbox: Are your files too large to send over email? Has your USB flash drive reached its max capacity?  Keep, manage, and share your files on the web using Dropbox.  Because Dropbox saves your files online, they can be accessed and/or downloaded on multiple devices.
  • GAHA: The Graduate Art History Association in the Department of Art History and Archaeology at the University of Maryland has created a Digital Survival Guide for new and current students.  The guide features information on websites, software, and other tech-related resources as well as tips for best practice.  GAHA has also compiled information on Forms and Funding.
  • H-Net: Housed at the Center for Humane Arts, Letters, and Social Sciences Online in Michigan State University, H-Net “creates and coordinates Internet networks with the common objective of advancing teaching and research in the arts, humanities, and social sciences.”  H-Net’s hallmark is the subject area or discipline specific email listservs generated by editors and contributors from around the globe.
  • MOOCs: Designed for the web and intended for a large audience, massive open online courses (MOOCs) utilize interactive web tools, readings, and instructional video to construct new course experiences. Popular MOOCs include Khan Academy, Udacity, edX, and Coursera.  Though these sites and courses cover a wide range of disciplines and subject areas, art history has been noticeably underrepresented.
  • SketchUp: Make is a free 3D modeling software.  Graduate students have utilized this software to reconstruct historical sites and spaces and design new or recreate gallery spaces populated with artworks.  Examples of extant projects can be found on the Projects Page, and include the Program for the Great Room, Royal Society of Arts, London and the gallery in the Art-Sociology Building at the University of Maryland.

Resources for Teaching

  • ARTstor: Funded by the Mellon foundation, ARTstor’s mission is to “use digital technology to enhance scholarship, teaching, and learning in the arts and associated fields.” Since its development in the late 1990s, ARTstor’s database has grown to over 1.5 million digital images.  Its collections cover a wide range of subject areas, from an archive of Islamic textiles to twenty years of contemporary New York gallery shows.
  • Dropbox: Are your files too large to send over email? Has your USB flash drive reached its max capacity?  Keep, manage, and share your files on the web using Dropbox.  Because Dropbox saves your files online, they can be accessed and/or downloaded on multiple devices.
  • JITP: (or The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy) As we continue to integrate technology into our classrooms, it is important to not only see what our colleagues are doing, but to share our own efforts.  The JITP is a scholarly e-journal devoted to promoting "open scholarly discourse around critical and creative uses of digital technology in teaching, learning, and research."  It includes peer reviewed articles by academics from numerous disciplines, tips for using technology in the classroom, and classroom-tested assignment examples.
  • MOOCs: Designed for the web and intended for a large audience, massive open online courses (MOOCs) utilize interactive web tools, readings, and instructional video to construct new course experiences. Popular MOOCs include Khan Academy, Udacity, edX, and Coursera.  Though these sites and courses cover a wide range of disciplines and subject areas, art history has been noticeably underrepresented.
  • Prezi: is a presentation tool. Prezi allows for a more dynamic and engaged arrangement and representation of your ideas outside of the tradition linear lecture format.
  • ThingLink: Are you looking for a way to enhance your images with information, sound, or other images?  Want your students to identify iconographic elements in a painting?  Thinglink may be just the technology you need.  Easy and free to use, thinglink users can create interactive learning modules (ILMs) to supplement their learning experience.