MemoryMiner as a Multimedia Teaching Tool

Brenda Neece, Adjunct Assistant Professor and Curator of the Duke University Musical Instrument Collection
Department of Music

Project Description:

Brenda Neece, Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Music, tested the use of MemoryMiner in her Spring 2010 course Western Music Instruments, MUS150S.  She was awarded a CIT Jump Start grant for software licenses and  obtained a set of loaner iPod Touch devices through the Duke Digital Initiative for the assignment.

Building on her experience in the 2008-09 CIT Video Fellows program, Neece and her students explored the use of MemoryMiner to create web-based interactive museum tours containing text, images, sound and video.  The tours included organs in Duke Chapel and instruments in the Duke Musical Instrument Collections and can be browsed using mobile devices.  A sample tour produced by one of the students in the course can be viewed online – a version for mobile devices, as well as a version in Google Maps, are also available.

Memory Miner sample project

Neece’s goals for the assignments included having her students become more familiar with digital storytelling with video, Google Maps and other technologies.  Neece hoped that the students, using multimedia and location information technologies in their assignments, would be able to make connections between different types of media, maps and other facets of the history of the instruments.  The students critiqued the work of their peers as they explored the interactive tours created in the course.

Memory Miner - mobile interface

Neece felt the project went well, though there were some difficulties with working out the logistics for the projects and getting students familiar with the different multimedia software used in the course.  “We learned quite a bit about the software, use of the software in labs, use of the software in presentations both from the iPods and from laptops,” she said.  “However, it is going to take some more time to make the workflow flawless.”

CIT funding for the project was used to purchase a set of licenses for the MemoryMiner software so that the students could use it in OIT’s Multimedia Project Studio labs during the Spring semester.  Staff from OIT worked with Brenda and the CIT on the project and were very helpful in getting the software in place for the students to use in the course.  In addition, Trinity IT support staff worked to get the software installed on Brenda’s office computer.

Project start date:  2/1/2010
Funding awarded:  $340