{"id":9119,"date":"2020-04-08T09:17:01","date_gmt":"2020-04-08T08:17:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.facsimilefinder.com\/articles\/?p=9119"},"modified":"2022-06-02T07:25:35","modified_gmt":"2022-06-02T06:25:35","slug":"teaching-special-collections-in-the-time-of-covid-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.facsimilefinder.com\/articles\/teaching-special-collections-in-the-time-of-covid-19\/","title":{"rendered":"Teaching Special Collections in the Time of COVID-19"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Just as my graduate seminar on codicology and Latin paleography<\/strong> was moving into the part of the semester that would feature lots of hands-on activities<\/strong> involving Special Collections materials\u2014manuscripts, manuscript leaves, and manuscript facsimiles\u2014, the COVID-19 pandemic pushed the course into a distance education format<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/span>Videos help bridge the gap<\/strong> between students and medieval material culture<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Of course, nowadays there is a robust presence of medieval manuscript material available as digital surrogates on the internet. Interacting with those digital surrogates, however, fails to convey<\/strong> much of what beginning students of codicology and paleography desperately need<\/strong> in order later in their careers to interpret those very surrogates with confidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

With limited experience of manuscripts in the flesh, it is difficult for students to envision scale and the manuscript context<\/strong> when viewing individual pages online, even when the photography is\u2014as it often is\u2014of high quality. When Facsimile Finder offered to make videos in aid of teaching during the pandemic, I leapt at the opportunity, and Facsimile Finder created a video especially for my class<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For our unit on the medieval liturgical calendar<\/strong>, the students were introduced to the subject through the J. Paul Getty Museum\u2019s excellent video and a document I prepared for them on a single calendar page, explaining all of the elements of the text (with translations) and decoration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How I Built an Assignment for Students Based on a Facsimile Video<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cView the video on thirteenth-century calendars by Facsimile Finder<\/strong> (at full screen on the largest screen to which you have access). Each student is to start a discussion thread by citing a frame (by minute and second) of the video and posing a question about something you see there<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/span>Videos allow students to focus on details<\/strong> that would otherwise go unnoticed<\/span><\/div>\n\n\n\n

It can be about anything: an aspect of the decoration, an aspect of mise-en-page, or what a particular text says or how it functions (required). If you are so inclined, you can address a classmate’s question (optional).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The instructor will address all questions posed, and you are expected to check back at some time later in the semester to see how it all turned out for your question. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, to answer an obvious question<\/strong>: those are the hands of Giovanni Scorcioni, the owner of Facsimile Finder, who kindly made the video especially for our class.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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