GGR 480C  FIELD ANALYSIS
CAPSTONE FIELD COURSE FOR
UNDERGRADUATE GEOGRAPHERS
Department of Geography, Planning and Recreation
Northern Arizona University at Flagstaff
Taught by Professors Tom Paradis and Lee Dexter

Required Projects

Students will participate in one or two single-day trips and three multi-day trips around the American Southwest. Trip routes and destinations are chosen with the following criteria in mind:

• Experience a suitable variety of physiographic landform regions and geologic structures and processes.
• Provide the necessary diversity of human and physical geography field sites to satisfy the learning outcomes above.
• Allow students to interpret and analyze the entire urban hierarchy of places, from the small village settlement to the growing metropolis.

Students are required to successfully complete the following six types of projects to satisfy the course learning outcomes:

• Outdoor Lab in Physical Geography (Teams): Students work in teams to collect primary, quantitative data at one or more field sites. Team members work together to test a hypothesis, analyze the results, and synthesize the findings into a coherent research report.
• Oral Presentations (two total): Each student chooses a topic of interest and conduct background research on that topic. At the appropriate time and place during a trip, each student teaches the class about the chosen topic and provides an informative handout to other members of the class. Students play the role of geographic instructor during this exercise.
• Physiographic Cross Section (Teams): Teams of students synthesize geologic and landforms information into a comprehensive illustration designed for a college textbook of physical geography. The illustration includes dominant landforms and geologic structures for a transect that represents the east-west extent of the course's travels.
• Research Investigations (Three total, Teams): Teams of students will utilize a variety of qualitative and/or quantitative methods to investigate a substantial research problem during one multi-day trip. Teams will informally present their results on the final day of each trip. Data will be collected from multiple sites, and student teams will analyze and synthesize the results into one of the three following products: 1) Individual written report and group thematic map. 2) Team-written travel chapter and group reference map. 3) PowerPoint poster submission
• On-site Field Exercises (Several): Students are provided with three small-scale research projects to investigate specific questions requiring specialized field-based methods. Typically students will be informed about each exercise only upon arrival at the site. A written group summary, table, and/or map of the results is submitted for evaluation during the trip. No formal report or other end product is required.
• Final Course Portfolio (end of course): Each student compiles an individual course portfolio into a three-ring binder, including all products and notes required of the course. To receive full credit, the portfolio must be neatly organized with a table of contents and tabulated sections that include all of these components:
  o Course syllabus, itinerary
  o Field notes, reading notes
  o Handouts from all oral presentations
  o On-site field exercises (copies for all team members)
  o Physical geography lab report
  o Physiographic Cross Section
  o Two evaluated Research Investigations
  o Final, ungraded Research investigation (two copies)
  o One best-case, student-chosen project from another course
  o 3-page self-assessment essay on student learning.
  
  

Course Links

Home Page
Prepare for the first day
Department Policy for GGR 480
Student Learning Outcomes
Required Projects
Trip Itinerary
Evaluation and Regulations
Estimated Monetary Costs
Reading Assignments
The Camping Experience
Photo Gallery
Field Course Memoirs 2001
A Student Poem:
"The 480 Deployment"

Photos on these pages courtesy of Stephanie Smith, David Hawkins, Thomas Overly, and Tom Paradis