The following are a range of open education resources, ranging from learning modules to interactive books, that are used in some of our undergraduate courses. Some are meant to be done independently, while others are intended to be led or facilitated by a TA or instructor. They can be filtered according to key areas or themes of geographic inquiry (by clicking on one of the categories below) or by searching for keywords.
All of these resources are CC BY licensed unless otherwise specified, and with the clear exception of media embedded or streamed from third parties. Please feel free to use these OERs in part or in whole in your own classroom, or just for ideas!
Indigenous Issues in Conservation: An Interactive Book
September 29, 2021
Author: Nina Hewitt Background: This resource highlights the colonial legacies of mainstream conservation science and nature preservation, and introduces some of the terminology, practices and knowledge frameworks of Indigenous peoples particularly in the region of the Pacific Northwest (BC) and is directed toward Biogeography students, but offers only an introduction, that may be expanded upon […]
Canadian Wilderness Myth
April 16, 2021
Author: Loch Brown Teaching Notes: This learning activity is meant to accompany other class material on the social construction of Nature, in particular a reading by William Cronon entitled “The Trouble with Wilderness”, and asks students to explore this concept in relation to the Canadian context. Is there a distinctly Canadian Wilderness Myth […]
Globalization, Colonialism, and the Used Clothing Industry
April 16, 2021
Authors: Michael Jerowsky & Loch Brown Teaching Notes: This 20 year old documentary provides a great focus for discussion of geography, globalization, colonialism, and development through an exploration of how these intersect in the case of the global used clothing industry and its impacts on livelihoods and economy in Zambia. It traces both the drivers […]
Stanley Park Virtual Field Trip
March 20, 2019
The Technology of Virtual Reality This Geography VR project is utilizing cutting-edge innovative technologies. Virtual reality is an expanding platform that has grown ever since it’s first introduction, and is the key innovation that we will be utilized within this project. Photogrammetry and other technologies were also used, combining the best and newest innovations to […]
A Guide To Capturing and Preparing Photogrammetry For Unity
March 20, 2019
Working in collaboration with The Emerging Media Lab and Metanauts ( a dynamic small Vancouver VR start-up), we have been working to create VR field trips that entail photo realistic interactive environments built using photogrammetry techniques, and showcased with the HTC Vive running in Unity. In order to achieve this we have been using hand […]
Announcing FieldPress an OER plugin for WordPress
July 8, 2016
Today, we are excited to announce the beta release of a WordPress plugin that we have been developing for the last six months! FieldPress is a WordPress plugin that allows instructors to create and manage field trips online. This plugin provides instructors with a user-friendly environment to build field trips, add multimedia content, create assessments and manage students activity. FieldPress is an […]
Virtual and Augmented Reality Technology-Assisted Field Trips: Student-Based Approaches to Using New Technologies
April 19, 2016
In many academic fields, particularly geography, the experiential learning opportunities afforded by field trips have long been recognized as an important part of the curriculum (Orion, 1993; Scare, 1997). The hands-on experience students gain applying concepts and building new skills such as teamwork, decision-making and data collection and analysis are nearly impossible to replicate in […]