BRIEFING
Richard leBrasseur
Landscape architecture studio keeps pace during COVID-19 COVID-19 has caused remotedesign education to evolve rapidly, whether students and instructors are ready or not. The education paradigm specific to the landscape architecture design studio must respond; the practices and theories of studio-based learning and the challenges teaching techno-centric students must be revisited. A new remote teaching methodology – the Digital Review Session – was applied within a fourth year studio course, where students reported distinctly positive responses for multiple learning outcomes. Studio-based learning (SBL) is a challenging structure to evaluate design efficacy of problem-based learning. SBL includes ‘learning by doing’ and is primarily student-led (student work + instructor response) and embodies constructive, collaborative principles to co-develop ideas and solutions. ‘Drawing’ and the process of design is a competency tool, so the effective incorporation of critical feedback and insight is required. For the past three semesters, I have been using a recorded, synchronous audio-visual digital tablet whiteboard to conduct desk critiques. This Digital Review Session (DRS) approach aids with active learning, memory retention, critical reflection and project development, and was conducted at the desk with the student present; however as the COVID-19 teaching protocols were enacted, these sessions became fully remote. The strength of this DRS is the synchronicity – similar to a movie – where drawing image, screen markup, and audio commentary work together. This, to a high degree, imitates an actual studio desk critique with the added benefit of later being paused, zoomed in, and replayed to clarify ideas and comments at any remote location at any time. The digital desk10
crit or DRS was recorded utilizing a tablet and ‘digital whiteboard’ or the ‘digital trace paper’ application ShowMe (www.showme.com). Once completed, the DRS was emailed to the student. The app allows you to ‘record voice-over whiteboard tutorials’ and is available for iPad, Android and
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Chromebook. The hardware used was an iPad Pro with Pencil. The ShowMe Interactive Whiteboard is free, though a monthly fee enables storage of recorded sessions. To be clear, the objective was not to turn a digital tablet into a digital drawing tool; hundreds of programs exist for that. This specific
1. The fully recorded and emailed version of the ShowMe DRS has basic playback functions including full screen, volume, and play/pause. Source: Author
2. Still images from a DRS illustrating the iteractive design process (Top L to Bottom R). Source: Author
