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The problems with fieldwork: a

group‐based approach towards
integrating fieldwork into
the undergraduate geography
curriculum
a a
Martin Haigh & John R. Gold
a
Centre for Geography in Higher Education , Oxford Brookes
University , Headington, Oxford, OX3 OBP, United Kingdom
Published online: 24 Feb 2007.

To cite this article: Martin Haigh & John R. Gold (1993) The problems with fieldwork: a
group‐based approach towards integrating fieldwork into the undergraduate geography
curriculum, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 17:1, 21-32

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 Journal of Geography in Higher Education, Vol. 17, No. 1, 1993

The Problems with Fieldwork: a group-

based approach towards integrating
fieldwork into the undergraduate
geography curriculum
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MARTIN HAIGH & JOHN R. GOLD, Oxford Brookes University

ABSTRACT Field study, widely regarded as an essential part of geographical higher

education, is under severe pressure due to its high cost, resource demands and a
legacy of poor educational practices that have left it on the fringes of the curriculum.
This paper outlines a case study of an undergraduate module, framed around a field
course, which seeks to integrate fieldwork into the curriculum by combining training
in field study with training in research and presentation skills. The module employs
group-based project work throughout, with no items assessed individually. The paper
concludes by pointing to the pedagogic and tactical advantages of the approach
adopted, but warns against the overuse of group work.

Introduction
Events over the last 20 years have done much to undermine the position of
fieldwork in the undergraduate geography curriculum in the United Kingdom. The
combination of increasing student numbers and declining resources per capita have
created severe budgetary and logistical problems (Gold & Haigh, 1992). Colleagues
and managers, particularly those involved in student programmes that lack
fieldwork, are inclined to take an unsympathetic view of the priority given to
fieldwork. Fieldwork budgets present soft targets for the cost-cutters on college
resource committees and may require repeated, wearying campaigns even to keep
expenditures at current levels. Staff, too, may resent the small recompense given for
time spent teaching students in the field. For example, only one-third of the British
higher education institutions visited by Her Majesty's Inspectors during 1990-91
offered staff remission for fieldwork teaching and even that remission was usually
only a fraction of the time spent in the field (HMI, 1992, p. 4; see extracts from the
Report, below pp. 35-36).
The position of fieldwork is further damaged by poor teaching and learning
practices. Time spent in the field is all too often squandered, particularly on

21
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

residential field courses. Despite being expensive to run in terms of both staff time
and resources, they are rarely preceded by effective briefings. The result is that
students often arrive ill-prepared, having little familiarity with their field area (HMI,
1992, p. 5). Such field courses can resemble tourist excursions, with groups of
passively-disinterested students being bused from site to site and given notes that are
copied down without question or comment. Little attention is paid to the range of
skills which might be developed and the intended outcome is often no more than the
completion of written field notebooks (HMI, 1992, p. 8). Feedback sessions are rare.
Frequently, information collected in the field goes no further than those notebooks.
The fieldwork experience may be ignored by subsequent classroom teaching.
Yet this image of time poorly spent contrasts vividly with the emotional attach-
ment that many professional geographers express towards the ideal of fieldwork.
Notionally, at least, it is widely regarded as intrinsic to the very nature of being a
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geographer (Gold et al, 1991, pp. 21-35). Teachers feel that students need to get
out of the classroom and see landscapes or appreciate environmental problems at
first hand—for which surrogates like slides, textbook illustrations, or computer
simulations are not adequate substitutes. In doing so, it is argued that students,
inter alia, develop observational skills (Hart, 1969), acquire analytical skills (Louns-
bury & Aldrich, 1979), gain insight into 'real' research (Ashworth, 1983; Burt, 1988;
Schmid, 1992) and obtain a respect for the environment (Keene, 1987, p. 1).
Fieldwork is held to facilitate experiential learning and to encourage autonomous
learning. Finally, fieldwork is valued because it helps to break down classroom
barriers, cementing the cohesion of groups of students and promoting better
staff-student understanding (HMI, 1992, p. 1).
Seen against this background, this paper presents a case study of one geography
department's attempt to set aside its own mixture of prejudices and bad practices
and to integrate fieldwork into the heart of its undergraduate curriculum. The case
study concerns the design of a geographical inquiry module, first introduced in
1985, which embraces a 6-day field course and occupies a pivotal place in the
undergraduate geography programme at Oxford Brookes University. In the first
part of this paper, we supply background to the development of this module and
describe the criteria employed in devising its syllabus. We then consider the
module's structure, before commenting on the results of student evaluations. The
conclusion summarises our experience and warns about the wider implications of
using group work.

Background
Residential field courses have been part of the Oxford Brookes geography curricu-
lum since the foundation of its modular programme in 1974 [1]. For the first
decade, students were required to take two compulsory week-long residential field
courses as part of their studies: one held at the start of their second year of study at
a British location; the other held in the middle of the third year at a location in
Western Europe (usually Amsterdam). Table I analyses the basic characteristics of
the Amsterdam field course for 1982, which reveals a pattern that was broadly
typical of that period.
As a field course, it suffered from almost all of the problems outlined previously.
It demanded a high level of staff involvement and resources. Passive learning
abounded and few demands were made of students other than that they attend.

22
 The Problems with Fieldwork

TABLE I. Comparison of Oxford Brookes University field courses, 1982 and 1991

Amsterdam Brighton
1982 1991

No. of staff 4 3
No. of students 45 78
Status Compulsory, Compulsory,
third year second year
Departmental
funding Complete 45%
Student's Spending money Contribution
contribution to maintenance
and meals other
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than breakfast
Work done prior
to field course Minimal Extensive
Work done after Minimal Formal verbal
field course and written
reports
Assessment Equivalent to One module
0.20 of module

Individual members of staff took responsibility for particular days, with little
attempt to co-ordinate the conceptual and empirical material being presented.
Students had to complete a short, assessed project in the last 2 days of the field
course, but were not required to keep a formal field notebook. As a result, few were
even writing notes by the end of the week. Needless to say, little of this information
and training was integrated into classroom teaching. Holland was 'done' and then
ignored.
Perhaps the most curious aspect, however, was the staffs reluctance to reward
students for their participation. The students received a token mark for project
work and this was carried forward to a free-standing third-year module (with which
the field course had scant connection). Student requests for an improvement in this
situation were resisted. Quite why was seldom articulated, but centred on a strong
prejudice that the students went on field courses because they were geographers
(Gold, 1991, pp. 185-186). It was insisted that field courses were good for students,
fostered close staff-student relations and were already given sufficient assessment
credit. No further inducements were thought necessary.
This view had to be revised for three reasons. First, increasing financial pressures
made students unwilling to lose vacation time, when they could be earning money,
for little academic gain. (In a system like Oxford Brookes' modular course, where
students mix their study of geography with a wide array of other courses, fieldwork
can not be rescheduled in term time because of timetabling difficulties; indeed,
fierce competition determines which subject gets which vacation week for its
fieldwork). Second, the fact that other subject areas of the modular course gave full
credit for time spent on fieldwork weakened the geographers' case for only token
recognition to be given. Student representatives on committees complained that, if
field studies were worth doing, they were worth assessment credit. Finally, reduced
fieldwork funding in the early 1980s made the staff conscious of the need to make

23
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

better use of the reduced number of days that students would spend in the field. A
quinquennial review of the entire teaching programme in 1983-84 served as the
catalyst for change. The Geography Unit decided to seek a field course package that
was better integrated into the curriculum and gave students greater credit for their
efforts. The formula devised was to introduce a new second-year module called
'Geography and the Contemporary World' (GCW).

Remit
The initial remit for the GCW module involved three separate, and sometimes
conflicting, sets of objectives. First, the module was intended to fit in with the
strong society-environment orientation of the Oxford Brookes' geography pro-
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gramme. This programme includes a compulsory spine ('core') of modules that lead
students from considering practical environmental problems towards examining the
value systems which guide society's perceptions of, and remedies for, those prob-
lems. By positioning GCW in that core, it was pre-determined that the module
would adopt the environmental concerns of the core and that it would open issues
that could be developed in a subsequent environmental philosophy module.
Second, the course design team took on a set of agreed objectives concerned with
the nature of good educational practice. These were that students must be active
participants in their education and must take responsibility for their learning; that
students should learn through direct experience, learning by doing; and that the
teachers' role was primarily to facilitate and guide learning. In this way, it was
hoped that GCW would create an ethos of inquiry in which students would learn by
collecting, analysing and critically examining data themselves as active and autono-
mous investigators rather than passive and dependent memorisers.
Third, a set of objectives was devised that stemmed from the needs of the
geography programme as a whole. As initially formulated, it was intended that
GCW would:
—confirm the view that field investigation lies at the heart of the geographer's
craft;
—provide depth and insight into contemporary environmental problems;
—supply practical training in research methods to prepare students for tackling
their final year dissertation (considered the major piece of independent study
in their undergraduate careers and the mark of honours achievement);
—develop a reservoir of practical field experience for issues developed at a more
abstract and theoretical level in later courses;
—equip students with an understanding of the dynamics and problems of
working in groups; and
—enhance the employability of students by developing skills in autonomous
learning, problem-solving, teamwork and verbal presentation.

Structure and Strategy

The structure of the module that emerged is shown in Table II. GCW lasts for 6
months, spanning two terms and the vacation when, for reasons for timetabling, the
6-day residential field course must be held. The level of student involvement is
defined at precisely 120 hours. From the outset it was decided that all assessment

24
 The Problems with Fieldwork

would be through course work and that all assessment would be awarded to the
group as a whole [2] without variation according to the contribution of individuals
(Table HI). Within this framework, training in field study was combined with a
broad training in research techniques [3] and presentation skills. Throughout the
module, the students would work in teams of four to five to design and execute a
single research project with a substantive fieldwork content, ending with oral and
written presentations of their work. During this process, staff would act primarily as
facilitators and consultants. The module would have five phases.

TABLE II. Schematic plan of 'Geography and the Contemporary World' module

Weeks
1 Introduction
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2
3 Preparatory sessions
4
5 Project approval session
6
7 Tutorials (informal)
8
9 Poster session and fieldwork briefing
10
Vacation Field course (Brighton)
1
2 Tutorials (informal)
3
4 Conference weekend
5
6
7 Submission of written report
8
9
10

Building Project Groups

After an introductory session in which course documents were distributed and
course aims explained, the module opened with a session on group work and on the
formation of project groups. The student workbook that guided this process was
devised because early course evaluations suggested that team work created far more
difficulties than did the task of finding the actual topic for investigation.

TABLE III. Assessment structure

Item

1. Oral presentation of project 40

2. Performance as discussant 5
3. Written report 45
4. Preliminary presentation (field course) 10

100

25
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

The key ingredient here was the interpersonal stress that occurred in groups in
which some members were prepared to work long hours in expectation of a higher
grade while others wanted no more than to pass the course as painlessly as possible.
The workbook faced this issue head-on. The first task was for each individual to
write down the grade they desired from the module and the amount of effort that
achieving this desire might involve [4]. If any major discrepancy was shown, it was
suggested that individuals might well be happier joining another group with more
similar aspirations and intentions. Staff helped students to make this transfer as
required.
Later, the session moved on to consider the problems and processes of teamwork,
using an inventory based on Gibbs (1987). The students, in their prospective
groups, collectively completed a variety of exercises that emphasised the impor-
tance of co-operative endeavour. Specific elements dealt with identification of
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specialist roles for group members, making rules to work by, combating group
problems, the need for realistic timetabling, and the importance of organisation and
scheduling.
This session ended with a staff interview, in which staff asked each group of
students to declare what grade they hoped to achieve, explain how they will
organise themselves, and their time, to meet that expectation, describe the rules by
which their group will function (including any sanctions that might be applied
against members who fail to perform to expectation), and evaluate the combination
of special skills commanded by their individual members. Groups which failed to
produce clear evidence of having discussed and resolved such issues were required
to think further and harder.

Project Feasibility
Subsequent introductory sessions directed students' attention to devising a project
that is feasible in the time and with the resources available. These tackled a range of
topics found to have caused problems on previous occasions, especially the uses
and abuses of interviews, the problems of establishing and maintaining working
timetables, and avoiding data collection for its own sake. In each case, the same
strategy was adopted. Staff provided examples of bad practice, which student
groups worked through, examined the pitfalls present, and outlined better practice
through discussion. Between sessions, student groups had the opportunity to refine
their topics in optional tutorials with a member of staff. Information on previous
successful projects was made available to give students a clearer idea of what their
group might be expected to present and, on occasions, to suggest lines of inquiry
that might be developed further [5].
By the middle of the first term, the student groups had reached the stage where
they could submit their formal research proposals. These had to be justified both to
staff and to another group of students with whom they were paired at this stage and
whose work they would shadow for the entire module. This strategy had two
advantages. First, it increased awareness about the nature, character, and extent of
the work being undertaken by another group. Second, it involved the groups in the
constructive appraisal and revision of two project plans and helped each build upon
the strengths of the other.

26
 The Problems with Fieldwork

The Field Course

After another round of tutorials, to help groups eliminate any rough edges that
remained, students prepared themselves for the field course. This took place at
Brighton, a conurbation of approximately 250,000 people on the Sussex Coast of
Southern England, which offers a wide range of contrasting rural, urban and littoral
environments, opportunities to study a wide array of current environmental issues
[6], and also ample accommodation.
The five working days of the field course followed a standard pattern. Student
groups worked independently on their projects through the day, coming together in
the evenings, for seminars and sessions at which they presented short progress
reports. The staffs role in the field was confined to helping any group experiencing
specific data collection problems and to guiding changes of direction or emphasis in
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the projects. Occasionally, one or two groups failed to prepare themselves properly,
or ran into unforeseen difficulties, and so demanded large amounts of staff effort to
resurrect their project, but experience showed this to be unusual where preparatory
work had been carried out properly. Indeed, from the staffs point of view, the bulk
of the work lay in running the evening sessions.
The most important of these sessions was held on the last evening and provided
an introduction to the centrepiece of the second term—the 30 minute verbal
presentation that the group would undertake at the 'Conference Weekend'. Each
group was required to make a short (10-minute) presentation at which they
presented their findings and took a turn at acting as 'discussants' for the group that
they had been shadowing. This exercise carried a token 10 per cent assessment of
the total to ensure that it was taken seriously, but the aim at this stage was
primarily to ensure that each group benefited from having the staff and the rest of
the students give a full appraisal of what they considered to be the strengths and
weaknesses of what they had heard.

The Weekend Conference

From their return to the University at the start of the new term, 4 weeks remained
for the student groups to prepare their verbal presentations of findings. Further
tutorials with staff, again optional, were available to help them either with points of
data analysis or with planning their presentations [7]. Concerning the latter, specific
advice was given about what makes an 'effective' presentation which, we empha-
sise, is something that is unlikely to be achieved by reading out an essay or paper.
This advice included guidance about structuring a presentation, time-keeping, and
the use of audio-visual aids.
The presentations were made as part of a simulated 'Conference', held over a
weekend at a conference centre in the countryside near Oxford. The conference was
arranged into short symposia in which three groups, whose projects shared some
linking themes, made their presentations sequentially. Each symposium was fol-
lowed by a discussion period.
Each group tackled two assessed tasks during the weekend. The first, accounting
for 40 per cent of the total assessment for the module, was to make a 30-minute
presentation to describe their project and its findings. Experience showed that the
groups responded to an element of perceived competition in this session, vying to
create the best impression by seeking methods of presentation that got their
message across more effectively than their colleagues. Presentations varied widely.

27
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

Some involved a straightforward talk with slides, others used simulations of various
types, and yet others used plays, videos, even music.
The students' second assessed task (worth 5 per cent of the total assessment), was
to act as discussants for the group whose progress they had followed through the
module. Being a discussant involved the group in taking responsibility for provid-
ing a brief verbal summary of another's presentation, highlighting points of
strength, weakness or importance, and for leading a subsequent open discussion.
The 'discussant' team would also provide a peer assessment rating of the team
whose work they had followed, presenting an evaluation of that team's performance
in their own project and as 'discussants' of a third project.
Besides acting as assessors, an aspect discussed in more detail below, the role of
the staff during the conference weekend was restricted to chairing the symposia and
discussion periods. The proceedings of discussion periods were left entirely to the
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student discussants and the audience. Out of loyalty to one another, perhaps, they
invariably rose to the responsibility placed upon them and produced worthwhile
discussions. Uneasy silences were rare.

The Written Report

Students followed up their work at the conference weekend by preparing a written
report (worth 45 per cent of the total assessment for the module). Each group
presented this as a scholarly research paper after the style of an undergraduate
dissertation (5000 words, typed, illustrated and with a bibliography). For this task,
they were given information and style sheets to help them in the task of preparation
and optional tutorials were made available. They were told that the report must
include a meticulous justification for the study, a review of related writings,
description and analysis of technique and method, critical evaluation of findings
and suggestions for further research by future project groups.

Discussion
As the two staff involved in running this course since its inception, we have
constantly tinkered with the elements of the course to reduce what we considered
to be its deficiencies. Several changes were implemented in response to student
evaluations. Student comments were collected at the end of the last formal session
of each course. Students were issued with a sheet of paper and asked to write, as
fully as they could, what they thought of the module and their experiences within it.
The evaluation sheets were unsigned. Nevertheless, comments collected remained
dominantly enthusiastic throughout the 6-year life span of the module. The stu-
dents appreciated the communication, presentation and group work skills devel-
oped by the module and enjoyed the freedom that the module allowed them to
develop their own ideas. The frequency with which students undertook disserta-
tions that followed up themes initiated in GCW provided practical testimony to
this point. Students also appreciated our practice of teaching research techniques in
a reactive fashion, i.e. working with the problems of individual groups in response
to their requests.
However, serious reservations were often expressed about the interlinked ques-
tions of group work and work load. To elaborate, the nature of the module, with its
competitive edge when approaching the presentation phase, encouraged student

28
 The Problems with Fieldwork

groups to become heavily involved with their work, devoting larger amounts of
time than strictly necessary to the module. The subsequent reckoning at the end of
the module led them to feel that their efforts were insufficiently recognised by a
module that offered only one credit for what they saw as two terms' work.
Seemingly as a result of their dissatisfaction with this point, students often began to
express dissatisfaction with other aspects of the assessment system, arguing that
certain members of their group had not pulled their weight and did not deserve the
same mark as themselves.
On the first occasions that this occurred, the staff argued, with some justification,
that the work load was comfortably within the 120 hours permitted. This singularly
failed to impress the students and, in time, increasingly failed to impress us. We
began to feel that if students were commonly investing this amount of time in the
module, we needed either to reduce the workload or to lower expectations of what
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was required. We opted for the first course of action, which led us to remove several
introductory exercises that were originally part of the programme (e.g. the removal
of a requirement that each group prepared a library research dossier before the field
course to help define their study topic and area).
Moreover, while retaining our precept that all members of the group should
receive the same mark (see note 2), we also recognised that it was necessary to take
steps to establish an assessment system that is as transparently fair as possible. Each
of the oral presentations, therefore, received three sets of assessment: self, peer and
staff. The criteria to be employed for assessment were discussed and agreed with
the class as a whole prior to the final conference weekend. Standard forms were
issued to each party involved in the assessment process, with each form having
identical marking criteria (see the example in Table IV). The final mark was
reached by negotiation.

TABLE IV. Oral presentations: a specimen peer assessment sheet

Peer assessment form

Please judge the quality of what you have heard today on the basis of the following criteria:
1. Have the members of the group described a project that is relevant to the aims of this course?
(If in doubt, consult the Course Guide.)
2. Did the work that they have done match the aims of the project?
3. Was the methodology appropriate?
4. How did you judge the originality of the presentation?
5. Was the presentation coherent and clearly structured?
6. What was your judgement of the content of the presentation?
7. Did the members of the group answer questions adequately and generally show a mastery of
their topic?
8. Other comments?
Suggested mark: /100

Other problems with GCW came less from students than from staff. It was
common for the department to view this module as a convenient dumping ground
for various things thought desirable as part of an undergraduate's research training,
despite the implications for the students' work load. More conservative colleagues

29
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

also found unnerving the suggestion that formal lectures, on topics like research
methods, were not needed. It was only the quality of the final verbal and written
presentations that eventually persuaded them that student groups always coped
adequately, and often fared much better, through acting autonomously. The under-
lying philosophy, therefore, survived.
Over the years, our greatest disappointment proved to be the final written
reports. We always emphasised that while this report must consider the discussions
of the conference weekend, it must be very much more than a script from the
conference presentation. However, each year, groups lost marks by failing to take
on board the distinction between the two exercises. Even after 6 years in which
conference presentation standards rose progressively, the standard of the written
reports made relatively little progress, most commonly because students did not
read around their subject, did not relate their work back to the literature of
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geography, or failed to grasp the wider implications of their case study.

By contrast, the most successful element, and that which was altered least, was
the 'discussant' system. This requirement that project teams follow the progress of,
and lead formal class discussion on, the progress and outcomes of another project
group's work proved very valuable. The 'discussant' system helped to resolve the
tension between the general aims of the course—to collect, collate, and review field
experience across a wide range of environmental issues—and the specific needs of
each project group to complete a good project. The system also helped ease
students' thoughts away from the minutiae of their work towards the work and
views of, at least, two other groups: the one for whom they provided discussion, and
the one that provided a critique of their work. Further, since each group was
required to return an assessment sheet for both their own presentation and that of
the group for whom they acted as discussant, the exercise also set them on the road
to consider what it is that constitutes a better or worse presentation. These thoughts
could be focused and made secure by staff comments at the close of each presenta-
tion session.

Conclusion
The course described in this paper came about as a result of one department's own
use and abuse of field study. While still capable of further development, the model
adopted has yielded concrete results in terms of student performance and has
helped us to make sense of field study as part of our own undergraduate curriculum.
Its centrality to that programme has allowed us to defend the position of fieldwork
as part of the curriculum. We believe that it has assisted us to overcome several
problems common to field courses that stand apart from the general curriculum,
such as poor preparation, insufficient active learning, and the absence of proper
feedback sessions (cf. HMI, 1992).
GCW also provided a means by which some of the problems caused by rising
staff-student ratios could be tackled. In the first place, quite apart from offering
advantages in its own right, the active involvement of students in the learning
process means that, apart from a few introductory sessions, staff are involved
primarily as advisers and assessors. There is relatively little formal teaching.
Secondly, students working entirely in small groups provide an effective way of
retaining an important informal tutorial basis for the module without overloading

30
 The Problems with Fieldwork

staff. Group work is becoming increasingly popular in geography courses (Jenkins

and Pepper, 1988; Healey, 1992).
Despite these tactical advantages, we recognise that students remain individuals
with individual needs. One reason why GCW has been successful is that use of
group work, a shibboleth of non-traditional higher education teaching, has been
moderated elsewhere in the programme. Whatever the pressures created by rising
student numbers or by moves for curriculum reform, group work is not the answer
to every problem. It does not suit every programme nor every student. It is prone to
abuse by cynical student free-loaders and its over-use generates boredom and
sometimes outright hostility amongst even the most diligent students. Indeed, if the
system is used too heavily, 'high flyers' may be held back by the effort of pulling
along less talented colleagues. Hence any attempt to replicate the approach to field
study advocated here would require careful scrutiny of not just the context into
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which the field study programme is fitted, but equally the general use made of group
work in the curriculum.

Correspondence: Martin Haigh and John Gold, Centre for Geography in Higher
Education, Oxford Brookes University, Headington, Oxford 0X3 OBP, United
Kingdom.

NOTES
[1] Comparative analyses of the 1974 and 1991 programmes were included in Gold (1991), to
which, to save repetition here, we would refer readers for details of course structure and
requirements. This paper also contains passing mention of the problems of integrating field
work into a modular programme. We are grateful to Alan Jenkins for his encouragement to
expand that aspect in this article.
[2] At the time, we were consciously pioneering practices for group assessment against a back-
ground of scepticism. We adopted this uncompromising approach to emphasise that the group
was a collective that sank or swam as a whole. At the time, most student groups accepted the
logic of this policy. (This, we note, has recently returned to vogue in Business and Management
where researchers are attempting to learn from recent Japanese vs American experience.
Competition between individuals within an enterprise may be destructive, since it is the
enterprise as a whole which is actually involved in competition. Hence, long-term success for
its individuals depends on their co-operating to improve the competitiveness of the whole.)
Nevertheless, subsequently, we began to favour marking systems which allowed the groups to
recognise the different contributions made by different team members. Our early attempts to
introduce peer-assessed moderation of group marks were blocked by the Geography Field
Committee. However, more recently, such arrangements have appeared in several areas of the
Oxford Brookes University Geography programme.
[3] Students receive formal training in research techniques in first year modules and during first
year field courses (Gold, 1991). During this course, much research training was undertaken in
tutorial sessions geared to the needs of individual project teams (Gold and Haigh, 1992).
[4] Although this approach is contentious, questionnaire investigations of the approaches to study
adopted by Oxford Brookes University students have determined that the issue is important.
There is a well-developed strategic orientation, which means that course choice is governed by
expectations of grade as much as by course subject, quality, or practical utility (Haigh, 1983,
1986).
[5] This is also a mechanism for creating a small, progressive improvement in the quality of
submitted work by establishing a slightly above average product as the class norm for each
succeeding year.
[6] Examples of student project topics include: beach and water quality in the Brighton area; land-
use conflicts at the urban fringe; problems of solid waste disposal; tourism 'Blessing or

31
 M. Haigh & J. R. Gold

Burden?'; geography of lead in the roadside environment (video); environment and the
development of Shoreham Harbour; trampling and footpath ecology/management on the South
Downs; nitrate pollution of rural watercourses; preservation vs conservation: the case of the
West Pier, Brighton; management and causes of storm damage in Brighton woodlands;
environmental impact of the Brighton bypass; comparison of coastal defence strategies of local
authorities (video); causes of accelerated agricultural soil erosion—South Downs; noise pollu-
tion along Brighton's highways; environmental constraints on the mobility of Brighton's
elderly/disabled; environmental education—creating a Cuckmere Haven landscape trail; evalu-
ating environmental education in Brighton schools; flood hazard and river defences of the
River Adur; pollution of the River Uck—sources and perceptions.
[7] Originally, it was thought that some of these functions could be tackled in informal class
sessions. However, differences in the rate at which different groups developed their project,
plus the individual and specific character of most data analysis and presentation problems
ensured such activities were most effectively tackled as group by group tutorials.
Downloaded by [Oxford Brookes University] at 09:56 04 October 2014

REFERENCES
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in Higher Education, 7(2), pp. 141-149.
BURT, T. (1988) A practical exercise to demonstrate the variable source model, Journal of
Geography in Higher Education, 12(2), pp. 177-186.
GIBBS, G. (1987) Making Groups Work, Oxford Polytechnic, Educational Methods Unit.
GOLD, J.R. (1991) Why modularisation, why now, and what implications does it have for
geographical teaching?, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 15(2), pp. 180-187.
GOLD, J.R. & HAIGH, M.J. (1992) Over the hills and far away: group-based field courses, in: A.
JENKINS & G. GIBBS (Eds) Teaching Large Classes: maintaining quality with reduced resources,
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Teaching Geography in Higher Education: a manual of good practice (Oxford, Basil Blackwell,
Institute of British Geographers Special Publication 24).
HAIGH, M.J. (1983) Course Evaluation (Oxford Polytechnic: Submission to the Council for
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HAIGH, M.J. (1986) The evaluation of an experiment in physical geography teaching, Journal of
Geography in Higher Education, 10(2), pp. 133-147.
HART, J.F. (1969) The undergraduate field-course, in: Association of American Geographers Field
Training in Geography, pp. 29-38 (Washington, DC, Association of American Geographers,
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HEALEY, M.J. (1992) Curriculum development and 'enterprise': group work, resource-based learn-
ing and the incorporation of transferable skills into a first year practice course, Journal of
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HMI (HER MAJESTY'S INSPECTORATE) (1992) A Survey of Geography Fieldwork in Degree Courses,
Summer 1990-Summer 1991: a report by HMI (Report 9/92/NS, Stanmore, Middlesex, Her
Majesty's Inspectorate, Department of Education and Science).
JENKINS, A.J. & PEPPER, D.M. (1988) Enhancing student's employability and self-expression: how
to teach oral and groupwork skills in geography, Journal of Geography in Higher Education,
12(1), pp. 67-83.
KEENE, P. (1987) Thematic Trails (Oxford, Thematic Trails Press).
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(Columbus, Ohio, Merrill).
SCHMID, T.J. (1992) Classroom-based ethnography: a research pedagogy, Teaching Sociology, 20,
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