Flipping and still learning: experiences of a flipped classroom approach for a third-year undergraduate human geography course

The flipped classroom approach, a form of blended learning, is currently popular in education praxis. Initial reports on the flipped classroom include that it offers opportunities to increase student engagement and build meaningful learning and teaching experiences. In this article, we analyse teacher and student experiences of a trial flipped classroom application in a third year undergraduate human geography course that challenges conventional thinking and practice in resource management, including an explicit focus on the marginalization of Indigenous knowledges in that context. The flipped classroom trial included empirical research with teachers and students to gauge the strengths and weaknesses of this mode of learning. Interviews, focus groups, surveys, reflections and participant-observation activities were conducted before, during and after the course. The research shows that this particular implementation of the flipped classroom approach generated multiple experiences for teachers and students, some constructive, others less so. Overall, space, time and flexibility matters not only to the kinds of pedagogical tools we employed to tailor learning to students’ differing needs, but also to the kinds of learning spaces – online and offline, individually and in groups – in which learning happens.     

Cattle mobility in prehistoric Britain: strontium isotope analysis of cattle teeth from Durrington Walls (Wiltshire,Britain)

An important role has been envisaged for cattle during the Neolithic period in Britain based on their prominence within the faunal assemblages of the period as a whole. The relative ease with which cattle can be moved over long distances and the requirement to provide ample pastureland leads almost inescapably to the consideration of prehistoric cattle movement. This paper presents the results of an investigation into the mobility of Late Neolithic cattle at the well-known site of Durrington Walls, Wiltshire. ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr values from cattle (Bos taurus) teeth were compared to local vegetation samples, well established values from archaeological material and to known geological conditions in order to determine whether individual animals were raised in areas with similar geological conditions as those found at the site (i.e. chalkland), and therefore whether the animals were of allochthonous or autochthonous origin. In total, 13 mandibular molars from Durrington Walls were analysed. Two of the animals included in the study were certainly raised under conditions similar to those found in the vicinity of Durrington Walls, but the other 11 provided signatures so distinct from that found locally that they could not have been raised on chalkland. From the results it is suggested that cattle were brought to the site from a variety of grazing areas in different parts of Britain. The implication of these findings is that the movement of cattle was undertaken during the Late Neolithic, and that in a number of cases substantial distances must have been traversed in order for animals to reach the site. In addition, the study provided valuable information for the interpretation of the site, which attracted people from a variety of regions, probably for ceremonial reasons.