Simple Explanation (ELI5)

Think of a digital treasure hunt: students use an app to locate and record old aqueducts, mills, and fountains, turning their classroom into a team of explorers preserving the Mediterranean’s water history.

Key Advantages & Current Limits

🟢 Pros: Builds hands‑on GIS, coding and teamwork skills while exploring local heritage. 🔴 Cons: Needs teacher training and school‑university coordination, and can be limited by device access or connectivity.

Future Outlook & Takeaways

Over the next 3‑5 years, the model could spread to other regions, enhanced with AR and open‑source data to engage more students and support water‑resource management.

How Can Technology Transform the Discovery of Water Heritage?

Article

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The Erasmus+ H2OMap project brought digital technology into secondary schools to explore the Mediterranean's water heritage. Students, guided by teachers and university researchers, used a mobile app to map ancient aqueducts, mills, and fountains on site, creating a georeferenced catalogue. The data were uploaded to an online database and displayed on an interactive geoportal with StoryMaps, linking history, geography, and science in a single pathway. Over 390 participants documented more than 100 water‑heritage elements, boosting their GIS, coding, and teamwork skills. Hands‑on activities heightened environmental interest and awareness of water management, showing that place‑based learning is more engaging than traditional lessons. The project produced a methodological guide, an e‑learning course, and a reusable multimedia platform for other schools. Results indicate that, with solid school‑university coordination and teacher training, the model can be replicated elsewhere, keeping geospatial standards open to ensure data continuity.

Bonus

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The methodological core of H2OMap is participatory GIS (PGIS), which blends student‑citizen mapping capabilities with Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) open standards. The Android mobile app leverages GPS for precise geolocation and allows entry of metadata (epoch, type, conservation status) following the ISO 19115 schema. Collected data are transformed into shapefiles and uploaded to a GeoServer, where they are published as WMS/WFS for geoportal access. The workflow was tested using design‑based research (DBR), gathering qualitative data (teacher interviews, student focus groups) and quantitative data (usage logs, pre‑post GIS competency tests). Analysis showed an average 27 % increase in thematic map reading skills and a 19 % improvement in linking historical data to current environmental contexts. Pedagogically, the project aligns with STEM‑based learning, promoting cross‑disciplinary integration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics with humanities. The school‑university partnership ensured continuous technical support, while teacher training delivered via the e‑learning course included modules on digital cartography, sensitive data management, and formative assessment methods. The platform is released under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC‑BY) license, allowing educational institutions to reuse and adapt the content, fostering the spread of geospatial open‑data teaching practices. Moreover, interactive StoryMaps enable narrative‑visual storytelling of water heritage, enhancing students' digital storytelling abilities—a skill increasingly demanded in the future job market.