She was motivated by an interest in continuing to participate in archaeological excavations at the Menkaure Valley Temple in Giza, Egypt, while also working to fulfill her teaching responsibility to undergraduates at Brown. Thus EGYT 0500, The Pyramids in Context: Archaeology of Life and Religion of Death in Old Kingdom Egypt, became an online course from the start.
“I was provided with a lot of guidance and support, and I grew even more excited about the idea of teaching remotely about the Old Kingdom pyramids while literally seeing them from my room’s window,” says Almansa-Villatoro.
Almansa-Villatoro went through the approval process for new courses, which included a review by her department and then final review with the Dean of the College. She started the process in May 2019 in coordination with the School of Professional Studies, and by September she was working with instructional designers in CIS. In addition to the course videos, she also collaborated with CIS to design an interactive map of all the Egyptian pyramids, and an Old Kingdom chronology with pictures. Finally, the videos were embedded on the Canvas page and the course was ready to debut in Canvas in mid-January just before classes started on campus.
The course videos were filmed at the University’s new Studio 225, a space available to the Brown community for video shoots, live interviews, remote teaching, video lecture, audio podcasts and more. Almansa-Villatoro was one of the first users of the space and was thrilled with the results. [Learn more about the studio.]
Almansa-Villatoro’s course is divided between fourteen modules, most of which have a short video-lectures that expand on certain concepts that are harder to grasp from the readings alone. Each module has mandatory readings, assignments and discussions.
Since the assignments are so frequent, Almansa-Villatoro wanted to make them as interactive and enjoyable as possible. One of the assignments asks the students to record a mock radio-show podcast in which they would discuss a recent Old Kingdom discovery in an engaging way.
Students were offered online tutorials and she organized two discussions per week. One of the discussions is content-focused, while the other prompts the students to share something about themselves, their previous knowledge about ancient Egypt, and their interests.
“I believe that my collaboration with the SPS online team and instructional designers has resulted on high quality course materials (videos, interactive map, timeline) that I would not have considered exploring had I been teaching in a traditional way.”
The experience has prompted Almansa-Villatoro to brainstorm new ways to make teaching more engaging and promote in-class interaction, which she will use in future in-person and online courses.
“Teaching online is an emerging concept with substantial benefits for both instructor and student, such as flexibility, personalized schedule, and compatibility with projects abroad. I feel ready to build another online course and implement what this experience has taught me,” she says.
Almansa-Villatoro aspires to become a professor of Egyptology so that she can continue to carry out her investigations of libraries, museums and Egyptian sites. She enjoys teaching students who are interested in Egyptology as a future career or just out of curiosity and interest.
“I have had three main academic endeavors: research, teaching and fieldwork. I conduct all three of them with passion, and I would like to keep doing it as long as I can.”
Update: Victoria Almansa-Villatoro has returned to the United States to continue teaching remotely for the remainder of the spring semester; her fieldwork has been postponed.