Education Blog - Page 112

I recently heard some memorable words which stated that "wise people have recognized the importance of what it is like to not know".  This is different from the wisdom of "Socratic ignorance" but may be even more applicable to the use of GIS in education.  What it is like to not know in my view means that we as GIS educators understand the challenges that exist in embracing a new set of tools and methods that the use of geotechnologies entails in teaching and learning. In other words, "we've been there!" and can empathize.

I think this empathy is part of the reason why the online and face-to-face professional development workshops and courses (such as the T3G institute) have been so positively received by the education community over the years.  Because the instructors have "been there", as instructors, we approach each of these professional development events with sensitivity and humility.  As leaders of these institutes, we very purposefully model what we are teaching--we know what it is like to not know about GIS.

We understand what it is like to be immersed in new technology with its associated new terms and new tools.  We know what it is like to be simultaneously grappling with new ways of thinking, teaching, and learning.   I think back to the first time I took an ArcGIS Server course where all of the other students were systems administrators, who regularly used terms I only had vague notions of.  I am reminded on a daily basis how much I still have to learn about GIS, despite having used it since 1984.  It's very humbling to be taught new skills by someone who, for example, has "only" been using GIS for a few years. But veteran and new GIS educators alike have much to learn from each other.

GIS has become much easier to use over the past 25 years, though challenges remain.  However, for the good of the planet and for the good of our students, I believe that the challenges are worth grappling with.  And for those of us who have instructor roles--remember what it was like to not know!

ArcGIS Earth, which arrived earlier this year, is a free, powerful tool to visualize the Earth in 3D.  ArcGIS Earth runs via a program that you install on your computer (at the present time, Windows-only) and streams spatial data over the web.  You can add data that you or your students create, or data that local, regional, national, and international organizations have created on a wide variety of themes.  These themes include natural hazards, demographics, hydrography, ecoregions, energy, health, and much more.  Indeed, because ArcGIS Earth can access data in the ArcGIS Online cloud, the number of layers available are vast, and expanding daily.  Educators and students can also visualize data collected and stored on their own computers.  Let’s explore five activities that you can quickly and easily use in the classroom, at a wide variety of educational levels and disciplines.

1.  Study your community or region, or others around the world, using satellite imagery.  Not long ago, my colleague in geography gave me a tour of Yangmingshan National Park in Taiwan, which contains sulfur deposits, fumaroles, venomous snakes, and at least 20 volcanoes.  I can use ArcGIS Earth to teach about the physical geography of the park (shown in part, below).

Yangmingshan National Volcanoes Park, Taiwan in ArcGIS Earth.

2.  Teach about watersheds.  In the example below, I added the World Hydro Reference overlay to ArcGIS Earth, changed the base map to a topographic base map, and highlighted the boundary of a watershed in western Colorado.  Using this technique, you can teach students the relationship between watersheds, river drainage, and topography.

Examining watersheds in ArcGIS Earth.

3.  Investigate population density and world demographics.  In the example below, I added the world population density layer.  I can then add demographic data by country, location of major world cities, and other map layers to teach about world settlement patterns and why these patterns are important.

Population density visualized in ArcGIS Earth.

4.   Teach about the shape and size of the Earth.  Using the measurement tool in the example below, you can teach about Great Circle routes and much more about distances and the physical geography of the Earth.

Showing measurement and the Great Circle route in ArcGIS Earth.

5.  Study real-time data.  In the example below, I am using the oceans base map and earthquakes from the last 90 days to study the relationship between tectonic activity and the ocean trench northeast of New Zealand.

Earthquakes northeast of New Zealand visualized in ArcGIS Earth.

Much more can be done, but I hope that these examples help you think about how you might use ArcGIS Earth in your own instruction or research.

Gallery Applications for Curated Content Access

ArcGIS Online offers users the ability to create maps and applications for an entire enterprise. As the number of named users increases across a utility or company, the amount of content can increase rapidly and there is a stronger need for content management to ensure that users can find and access the maps and applications they need.

View a video of the demonstration.​

One of the tools that can help with content dissemination and end user experience is the Public Gallery Application.  Using your group settings, the application lets administrators control how their users interact with and discover content.  In the screenshot below, a utility has Gallery Applications for all of their departments.  As a user clicks on the Operations application, it launches a Gallery Application view of the Operations group with content filtered to hide feature services, maps, and other content.  Users are no longer overwhelmed with hundreds of maps and services, just a curated list of useful tools.

Groups

While Groups in ArcGIS Online offer a structure for sharing content and controlling access, they do not provide the best framework for providing users direct access to that content.

Very quickly, groups can become unruly as you share services, maps, documents, apps, and more to those groups.  Asking novice users to navigate through these groups could cause confusion or frustration. The screenshot below is from an Operations group with over 60 items.

Groups still provide the foundation for what content users have permission to access, but they do not provide the best user interface for navigating through that content.

 

Gallery Applications to the Rescue

One way to control the types of content that users have access to is by creating a Public Gallery web application from the group.  Basically, using a Gallery Application allows users to create a curated view of a specific group based on item types or tags.

While you are in the group you want to work with, click the Share button, select Create a Web App, and choose Public Gallery.  This will create a new application for you.

There are a number of options to configure the look and feel of the Gallery Application, but the most important settings are in the Gallery Options tab.  Here, you can control the types of items that will appear in the application, the number of items, the way they will appear, or you can use a search string to limit what items are shown.  Using the search string option, you could place a ‘Featured’ tag on all items in a group that would act as a filter, as shown in the screenshot below.

 

In the Enable Features tab, one setting to note is the “Show a list allowing users to filter by items type”. With this setting enabled, users have the ability to filter what they are seeing to maps, apps, dashboards, or other item types.  This combined with the tag search string provides powerful functionality for providing a curated, filtered view of items to your users.

After you Publish your application, it’s sharing can be controlled just like any other organizational item.  As depicted in the first screenshot, you could share your Gallery Application to the Featured Content group to create a list of all departments.  Or, you could start nesting Public Gallery applications in other groups, to create a Gallery Application of Gallery Applications.   

Closing

The Gallery Applications offer a range of possibilities for how administrators can begin to create custom views of content shared into groups.  Rather than forcing users to navigate through content heavy groups, they can be provided with a clean user interface that lets them quickly discover the content they need.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at: bbaldwin@esri.com

Dr Damian Gessler of Semantic Options recently gave a keynote address in which he stated, "transformational change is enabled as past technologies simplify."  Immediately, I thought of the many presentations and papers where a few of my colleagues and I have applied Everett Rogers' diffusion of innovations theory to GIS in education. Rogers theory focuses on how innovations are adopted, at first by innovators and then by early adopters.  Rogers says that for real change to occur with any technology, the early majority of users, representing one standard deviation below the mean, will need to adopt the technology.   Some of us are arguing that with the advent of web based GIS and the resulting lowering of technological and learning barriers, we are beginning to see an "early majority" of educators using GIS in their instruction.

Gessler's point perfectly applies to the use of GIS in education:  First, GIS has 50-year roots, so while one can argue that it is changing more rapidly now than ever before, it qualifies as a "past technology" as identified by Gessler.  Its methods and models have been tested, vetted, and refined.  Second, it has simplified in many ways--through the advent of the graphical user interface around 2000, web based services through the Geography Network of the early 2000s and on through the modern ArcGIS Online platform, and its ability to incorporate real-time data, multimedia (via story maps and other mapping applications), and field data through crowdsourcing and other methods.  As it has become easier to use, it has simultaneously become more powerful.

These two simultaneous trends are attracting people in a widening diversity of disciplines to the use of GIS.  As they do, decisions are increasingly made using the geographic perspective, and transformational change is enabled, to put it in Dr Gessler's words.  In the classroom at the primary, secondary, and university levels in formal and in informal settings, the use of the technologies and methods are beginning to effect transformational change in how skills, content knowledge, and perspectives are taught and learned.

Do you agree that we are seeing a transformational change with regard to the use of GIS in education?  What do you recommend that we as the community need to do in order to further encourage and hasten these developments?

ArcGIS Earth, which arrived earlier this year, is a free, powerful tool to visualize the Earth in 3D.  ArcGIS Earth runs via a program that you install on your computer (at the present time, Windows-only) and streams spatial data over the web.  You can add data that you or your students create, or data that local, regional, national, and international organizations have created on a wide variety of themes.  These themes include natural hazards, demographics, hydrography, ecoregions, energy, health, and much more.  Indeed, because ArcGIS Earth can access data in the ArcGIS Online cloud, the number of layers available are vast, and expanding daily.  Educators and students can also visualize data collected and stored on their own computers.  Let's explore five activities that you can quickly and easily use in the classroom, at a wide variety of educational levels and disciplines.

1.  Study your community or region, or others around the world, using satellite imagery.  Not long ago, my colleague in geography gave me a tour of Yangmingshan National Park in Taiwan, which contains sulfur deposits, fumaroles, venomous snakes, and at least 20 volcanoes.  I can use ArcGIS Earth to teach about the physical geography of the park (shown in part, below).

2.  Teach about watersheds.  In the example below, I added the World Hydro Reference overlay to ArcGIS Earth, changed the base map to a topographic base map, and highlighted the boundary of a watershed in western Colorado.  Using this technique, you can teach students the relationship between watersheds, river drainage, and topography.

3.  Investigate population density and world demographics.  In the example below, I added the world population density layer.  I can then add demographic data by country, location of major world cities, and other map layers to teach about world settlement patterns and why these patterns are important.

4.   Teach about the shape and size of the Earth.  Using the measurement tool in the example below, you can teach about Great Circle routes and much more about distances and the physical geography of the Earth.

5.  Study real-time data.  In the example below, I am using the oceans base map and earthquakes from the last 90 days to study the relationship between tectonic activity and the ocean trench northeast of New Zealand.

Much more can be done, but I hope that these examples help you think about how you might use ArcGIS Earth in your own instruction or research.

On the official Esri Blog's, there was an article pushed out almost 2 years ago that discussed the way users could begin using a barcode scanner with Collector to automatically populate a field.  Pretty awesome.

The one limitation of the article were some of the details that were missing.  "Why do I need an external scanner?" "Can I just use the device camera?" "Will the keyboard still work?"  So, what are the answers, and why 2 years later?

I am currently working with a few other individuals on putting together a solution for "Tracking and Traceabilty", a regulation that will be coming to gas distribution customers, most likely in the next year (read this StoryMap for more details).  In brief, the regulation requires users to capture the barcode information from any assets that are installed or updated (think gas pipes).  What better way to handle this regulation than with Collector?  Users can capture the coordinates of the feature, the barcode, installation date, and then sync all of this data directly with their production GIS, all with one device.  This was the impetus for revisiting the Collector barcode scanning capability and seeing what was possible today.

With the new release of Collector for ArcGIS, there is the ability to use a high-accuracy GPS and capture metadata.  So, users now have the ability to get sub-meter accuracy from Collector and view the real-time metadata of the GPS accuracy during a collection.  This is a huge enhancement, but what about the barcode scanning?  While the high-accuracy GPS pairs with and works across all devices (hardware), there were some minor differences with the barcode scanning.  I only tested 2 different types of devices for this workflow (sorry Collector for Windows).

Apple Devices

Using an iPad Air, I paired a Bad Elf GNSS Surveyor (thanks for providing Bad Elf!) as the external GPS unit (a separate Esri blog discusses this in detail).  The Collector Beta version (full release in June 2016) displayed the accuracy and full metadata streaming in from the unit, pretty cool.  Next, I paired a Socket Mobile CHS 8Ci as the external barcode scanner.  Out in the field (walking around the campus), I was able to collect barcodes using the trigger on the barcode scanner (using a test piece of PVC) and click on the scanner to disable it momentarily to use the keyboard to fill in other values.  All told, it worked really well.  One limitation I had, was with the type of scanner I was using, which only reads 1D barcodes (horizontal type).  The same company produces a 1D and 2D scanner, which could be used for QR barcodes and traditional, but I was not able to test with it.  Lastly, the scanner needed to be in HID mode, which basically replaces the keyboard, hence the need to click it and momentarily disable if you need to enter data via the keyboard.

This led me to a question, "Why not just use the camera to capture the barcode?"  While there are countless QR and barcode scanning apps, none of these integrate with the Apple keyboard, meaning, you could capture values in a separate app, copy the value, re-open Collector, and paste in the values, but that would be a pain.  Enter Android.

Android Devices

On a Samsung Galaxy tablet, I located an app available through a 3rd party that replaces the default keyboard on the device.  This keyboard has a 'scanner' button as part of the keyboard, allowing values to be entered directly into Collector without leaving the app and using the on-board camera.  Simply search the Google Play Store for "barcode scanner keyboard" and there are 2 apps by 'Tec-It' (make sure you install the 'keyboard/scanner' apps).  There may be other apps with the same functionality, but this is the only one I tested.  Also, I didn't test the paid version, but it looks like it can scan both 1D and 2D barcodes.  Using Collector, I was able to scan a barcode and then continue entering values using the keyboard right within Collector.  It worked really well and it was nice to only have the external GPS (Bad Elf) unit, rather than 2 extra devices I was carrying around.  Yet, to be fair, they probably weigh 6 ounces.

Closing

The one caveat to the Android scanner app, would be the quality of the scan.  Using the on-board camera will not give you the same consistency/quality as a laser based scanner built for one purpose only, to scan barcodes.  Keep this in mind when thinking of a solution.  Obviously, the ability to have one less piece of hardware is a benefit, but comes with a drawback in terms of consistency.

Both the iPad and Galaxy had their pros and cons, but either could be a great solution.  It was great to see how Collector could be deployed with both a barcode scanner and high-accuracy GPS unit to extend the types of data that could be collected and how it could be used for the Tracking and Traceability regulation.

Many of us attended graduation ceremonies this month; some of us have our own students graduating.  Amid these joyful events, I wanted to share several new resources about careers in GIS that are now available that I believe will be useful to students, educators, career counselors, and others.

First, the folks at the career and employment resource, The Muse, created a fascinating node on Esri with interviews of young people working here!

I created several new videos on my YouTube channel under "Career" such as a new series of 4 “career pathways in geotechnologies” videos, beginning here.  I also created a "Top 5 skills you need to be successful in GIS" series beginning here, a Geographer is a Green job video, and others.

The career development zone on the Esri EdCommunity page includes Esri career posters, a summary of the blog essays we have written on careers, links to industries that use GIS, some GIS heroes, videos of those who use GIS on the job as firefighter, city manager, and in other fields, and much more.

I also tell students to frequently check the job openings on www.geosearch.com, gisjobs.org, and our own Esri openings on http://www.esri.com/careers as they think about their future.

Esri also maintains an interesting  student opportunity page and a jobs zone on GeoNet is useful too.  Interested in talking with our staff about career opportunities?   See this page for upcoming events where our university recruitment team will be.  Feel free to contact the university recruitment folks on university @ esri.com.  Read this blog and the Esri Higher Education Facebook community to find out where the education outreach team will be speaking in the near future.

What are the best small towns in the USA?  To investigate these towns and their spatial distribution, I created a Story Map of the Top 100 Best Small Towns in the USA according to Livability.com.  I created it in part to show how easy it is to create a story map based on a news feature, current event, or something interesting that has a location component.  I also wanted to demonstrate a different method of creating a story map than those I have described in the past.

After deciding that the map tour story map was the type I wanted, I downloaded the map tour CSV template, and then once I populated the template with the Livability 100 towns data, I imported the CSV using the map tour app:

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The CSV populated the Map Tour captions from my spreadsheet.  If you would like to see what the CSV looks like, click here.  After uploading the CSV, I did make some small aesthetic updates in the story map app, but my work was essentially done. My resulting story map looks like this, below - click on the map to see it live:

My underlying ArcGIS Online map in "My Content" looks like this, below.  Later, I can add layers to this map that will be reflected in the story map, such as median age, median income, or other variables.

Another reason I created this map is that it provides a number of teachable moments.  In creating the story map, I made sure I practiced what I am always preaching to students: Cite your sources, including your photographs.

Furthermore, in teaching with the web, we as educators frequently tell students to check the methodology used.  Unlike some other sites that "rank" things but the "ranking" may represent only the opinion of the person writing the article rather than any sort of rigorous or scientific method, Livability clearly explains how they developed their ranking.  They work with the Martin Prosperity Institute, examining more than 40 data points for more than 12,000 towns with populations between 1,000 and 20,000: "These scores were weighted based on an exclusive survey conducted for Livability by the leading global market research firm, Ipsos Public Affairs. These cities and towns allow for the tight-knit communities key to small-town living coupled with the amenities you’d expect in larger cities," says Livability.  They used economic, health, housing, social and civic capital, education, amenities, demographics, and infrastructure as eight categories of "livability".  They used a national survey so that it is in part based on what people most value in communities, and also added some thoughtful considerations of their own.  They followed four guiding principles:  Access, affordability, choice, and utilization, and used Esri's lifestyle variables that allowed them to see which residents were making the most of opportunities in their cities.

Despite these well-documented and rigorous measures, you could use the map and the above discussion to ask the students questions such as:   "What variables are missing?  Several communities in western Washington and Oregon are on the map:  Are rainy winters a problem for you?  Or the cold winters that would be experienced in Bemidji, Houghton, or Bar Harbor? Or the occasional hurricane in St Augustine?  How important is being near to or far from a metropolitan area or a major airport to you?  Are there regions of the USA that are under-represented by the "100 best" towns, or over-represented?  What would your list of, say, 100, or 10 best, be?  Make a story map of your list! What would your list of 10 best in your own state be, and why?  What about a list of 10 best outside the USA?"

Blog post updated 3 January 2018. 

Geography summer camp?   I will be offering an exciting 5-week online course beginning 25 May - hope to see you online or ... please tell a colleague!

Geography Summer Camp 2016: Online 5-Week Geography Course | GIS Education Community

--Joseph Kerski

Folks:

I wrote about some of the ways you can share data through story maps, here:

Sharing Data through Story Maps | GIS Education Community

--Joseph Kerski