GEOG 456/ERP 595 Geographic Visualization (3 Credits, Fall 2007)
Lectures: Tuesday 8:00am–9:50am                             
Labs: Thursday: 8:00pm–9:50am   
Course Website: http://www.geography.siu.edu/people/oyana/teach.html

Instructor: Tonny J. Oyana
Office: Faner Hall Room 4438, 1000 Faner Drive, Mailcode 4514
Telephone: (618) 453-3022
Fax: (618) 453-6465
E-mail: tjoyana@siu.edu
Office Hours: Monday & Wednesday 10–11am

                                  Teaching Assistant: TBA
                                           Email: dljt@siu.edu
                                           Office Hours: TBA

         
Course Description Grading Rubrics
Required Text Course Outline and Schedule
Reading summaries Required Computer Skills
Overview of Labs   
         


Course Description
Geog 456/ERP 595 "Geographic Visualization" is an advanced-level undergraduate, to graduate-level course that provides an overview of geographic visualization with a concentration on the theories, concepts and approaches of information visualization. Lectures and laboratory exercises focus on theoretical and practical issues associated with exploratory data analysis (EDA), symbolic encoding and decoding, web cartography, data quality and generalization, visualizing uncertainty, data exploration, map animation and other multi-media applications.   
This class provides students with a working knowledge of commercial software commonly used for graphic-based applications such as ArcGIS, TerraSeer's Space Time Intelligence Systems (STIS), Geoda, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft FrontPage, and Microsoft Visio. Students are expected to utilize their hands on experience gained from the lab exercises to further enhance their proficiency in graphic software and design. In addition to class lectures and lab exercises, reading assignments, classroom assignments, and presentations are required. Two hours of seminar and classroom presentations, two hours of studio exercises of each week.

This geographic visualization course has a number of specific learning outcomes. It seeks to particularly to:

How to Succeed in this Course:

Students are expected to spend a minimum of 2 hours per hour of course studying and working on course related material outside of each lecture. Since this is a 3-credit course you should be spending about 9 hours a week outside of class in study. The planning of this course is based on methods and strategies that promote active learning among students and it is therefore expected of students to complete assigned readings, lab exercises, presentations, and one-to-two minute papers. Falling behind these expectations will seriously impair your ability from obtaining a passing grade in this course. Treat this course as you would treat a job and you will succeed.

Course prerequisites: Geog 310 or consent of instructor

Required Text
 Thematic Cartography and Geographic Visualization by Terry Slocum (Prentice Hall, 2005) (access some electronic parts of this text). Suggested Text: Dykes, J., A. M. MacEachren, and M.-J. Kraak. (eds). 2005. Exploring Geovisualization. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Reading summaries

The learning approach here is to use small group discussions. The central aim of using small group discussions is to promote group learning, speaking, and critical thinking. This approach encourages students to work in teams, read research articles, practice oral communication skills, and more importantly, improve on their writing skills. A research article is assigned to a small group during the first session of this course. Each group is tasked with reviewing, critiquing, preparing a presentation to the class, and writing one group critique at least one-to-two pages in length. Following the article presentation, all the students who are not members of the presenting group are required to submit at least a one-page critique review of the assigned articles. The individual summaries are due at the beginning of the next lecture after this presentation. A grade is assigned to each summary. No make-up's or late summaries are accepted (see due dates on schedule page). Please follow these guidelines to critique the assigned research articles:

  1. Provide full citation, Title, Author (s), Journal/volume/page number.

  2. Describe the main points, as well as the problem and conclusion.

  3. Remember to critically evaluate the article pointing out the strengths and weaknesses.

  4. Tips: How well are the objectives of the paper stated, and how well are they then followed throughout the article? Does the author provide appropriate references to justify the arguments made? Is the approach logical? Are the results interpreted reasonably? Are the conclusions valid? Does the abstract capture the main aspects of this article?

  5. Your article must be typed using a 12-point (typeface) Arial or Times Roman font with at least 1.5-line spacing. Each paragraph must be properly indented.

Overview of Laboratory Exercises 
 The individual laboratory exercises in Geog 456/ERP 595 build step by step into a final course project.  During this class session, we will run a total of ten labs, additional details will be provided by your TA for Geog 456/ERP 595 in the first lab. All labs will be conducted in the SEAL Room 2524, Faner Building. It is vital that students attend class on days that the exercises are assigned, as the Lab instructor will lead students through the steps necessary to complete the exercise. It is also vital to complete the exercises on time, as new exercises often depend on completion of the previous exercise. There is a progressive building of knowledge and skills from the first lab and last lab. Much of your grade on individual exercises is determined by completing the exercise on time.

Required Computer Skills
 Students taking Geog 456/ERP 595 should have basic competence in the Windows operating system, Excel spreadsheet, ArcGIS software, and HTML. This course will provide basic instruction in all of these software applications, but students will be expected to take initiative to learn additional details about the software and to solve problems as they arise. Students should expect to spend time outside of scheduled hours to complete the course project.
 Grading Rubrics—A total of 100 percent may be earned. Your participation and effort in class will be noted in the final compilation of grades. No extra work will be accepted for extra credit. Adjustments of course grades may be made depending on general performance and statistics. Since this is 3-credit class with a “2+1” split between lecture and lab, the 2-credit obtained from the lecture will contribute towards the final grade as follows:

Final course project

 35 %

Mid-Term

 25 %

Research articles

 10 %

Class and project presentations

 20 %

Participation & attendance

 10 %

The percentage of the total number of points and the corresponding letter grades are shown below:

Percentage/
Total Points

 Letter Grade

 Pass/Fail

 89–100 

A

 

77–88

B

 

67–76 

C

 

55–66

D

 

Below 55

F

FAIL 

 

Class Policy: No incompletes will be offered. All exercises must be handed in to receive a passing grade, regardless of how many points have been taken off for tardiness. Late assignments will be penalized at the rate of 10% per day. I also expect, and your fellow students expect, that every person in this class will adhere to the highest possible ethical standards. Academic dishonesty, including all forms of cheating and/or plagiarism, will not be tolerated in this class. By registering in this course, each one of you is explicitly making the following pledge of honesty: "I understand that any serious violation of ethical standards could jeopardize my future in this class. All submitted academic work must reflect my or the group's efforts and initiatives as described in this course syllabus." Additional information on this issue is available in the Student Conduct Code handbook and the Department of Geography and Environmental Resources website.

Emergency Procedures: Southern Illinois University Carbondale is committed to providing a safe and healthy environment for study and work. Because some health and safety circumstances are beyond our control, we ask that you become familiar with the SIUC Emergency Response Plan and Building Emergency Response Team (BERT) program. Emergency response information is available on posters in buildings on campus, available on the BERT'S website, Department of Public Safety's website (disaster drop down), and in the Emergency Response Guidelines pamphlet. Know how to respond to each type of emergency. Instructors will provide guidance and direction to students in the classroom in the event of an emergency affecting your location. It is important that you follow these instructions and stay with your instructor during an evacuation or sheltering emergency. The Building Emergency Response Team will provide assistance to your instructor in evacuating the building or sheltering within the facility.
 

Course Outline and Schedule (Last updated: 09/08/2008)—Subject to Change/Revision)

Date

Topic
Week 1: August 21st Course Description & Some practical issues: available systems, languages and computers
Week 2 August 28th What is Visualization? A Brief History and Scope of Visualization—Review Slocum Chapters 1, 2
Week 3: September 4th

Scope of Visualization and Cartographic Design—Review Slocum Chapters 1, 2

Andrienko, N., Andrienko, G., Gatalsky, P. Mapping Spatiotemporal Data for Exploratory Analysis. http://kartoweb.itc.nl/pubs/geovisualization/index.html 

Group I Presentation & Report Due
Week 4: September 11th Psychophysics and the Human Visual System, and using external aids (e.g. display systems) to enhance the Human Visual System.

Review research article: Senay, H., and Ignatius, E., 1998. Rules and principles of scientific data visualization http://www.siggraph.org/education/materials/HyperVis/percept/visrules.htm 

Group II Presentation & Report Due

Individual Summary Due

Week 5 & 6: September 18th–September 25th Graph-based visualization methods (scatter plots and other graph-based communication models and cartographic representation)—Review Slocum Chapters 3, 21

Individual Summary Due
Week 7: October 2nd Data Classification, Map Symbolization, and Choropleth Maps—Review Slocum Chapters 4, 5, 13
Week 8: October 9th Mid-Term Examinations
Week 9: October 16th Perception and Cognition

Review research article: Andrienko, G.L., and Andrienko, N.V., 1999. Interactive maps for the visual data exploration. International Journal of Geographical Information Science. 13(4) 355–374.

Group III Presentation & Report Due

Start to Think about Potential Course Projects

Week 10: October 23rd Graphic Design in Cartographic and Geographic Visualization—Symbolic encoding and decoding, lettering, line symbols, scale, and map generalization Review Slocum Chapters 4, 6, 10,11, 12

MacEachren A.M., Robinson A, Hopper S, Gardner S, Murray R, Gahegan M, Elisabeth, H. ( 2005). Visualizing Geospatial Information Uncertainty: What We Know and What We Need to Know. Cartography and Geographic Information Science, 32(3):139–160.

Group IV Presentation & Report Due
Week 11: October 30th Color Schemes & Spatial Data Mining

Individual Summary Due

Week 12: November 6th

Interactivity, Multimedia Mapping, Sonification, and Map Animations—Review Slocum Chapters 20, 21,22, 23

Week 13: November 13th Web Cartography—Virtual and Mixed Environments (GeoVRML: 3-D Representation of Geo-referenced data on the web)—Review Slocum Chapters 24, 25

Future Directions in Geovisualization
Week 13th: November 15th Student Presentations of Course Projects in the GIS Lab (SEAL)
Week 14: November 17th–November 25th Thanksgiving Holiday
Week 15th December 4th Submission of Web Page for Final Evaluation and Electronic Paper in PDF Format Posted
Week 16th December 14th Grades At SIU Record Office

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