By keeping track of, and reflecting on, powerful or meaningful experiences we have in digital places made by others, we can be thoughtful about the ways the places WE make can produce experiences.

One way to do this is by screencasting our time in digital places. This is a tool used by streamers and YouTubers, but is also a way we can keep track of how digital places make us feel things.

Follow this tutorial to set up the program OBS for screen-recording:

Tutorial: Screen-Capturing Virtual Explorations

(If you can't download OBS, or can't use it for any other reason, Screencast-O-Matic is a free, browser-based option, but it does print a watermark in the corner of the screen.)

In addition to video-recording our experiences in digital places, we can track our experiences by writing and drawing.

WRITTEN INVENTORY

An inventory is a list of things you have. You can make an "affect inventory" of the ways the digital place affected you - for example, what feelings you had or what actions you did! As you go through the digital place, write down:

• Something you saw that was interesting, beautiful, or strange.

• Something you heard that was interesting, beautiful, or strange.

• Something you did that was interesting, beautiful, or strange.

• Something in the digital place that would be impossible in the physical world.

• How did you feel in this world? What things made you feel that way?

SENSORY MAPPING

A sensory map is a kind of map that doesn't record where things are in a place, it records the experience of moving through a place. Every person's map will look different, even of the same place. The map on the top here came from my "virtual walk" in the video above. On the bottom map, the artist marked with a star points on the journey that were especially memorable experiences. When making a sensory map:

• Don't make it while you're going through the place! Rather, wait until afterward, and use your memory to draw it. This will help you focus on memorable experiences more than spatial accuracy.

• Record how you moved through the space. How could you visually show things like changes in speed or direction? How could you visually show points where you "stopped to smell the roses"?

• Use color to mark points where you had a significant experience. How you use color is up to you. Maybe different colors mean different feelings. Maybe different colors mean different intensities of feeling.

Exploring Digital Places Sheet

The above worksheet provides places to do a written inventory and a sensory mapping, and also suggest pairs of digital places from the below examples to assign to groups to experience and discuss.

If you are learning remotely or by yourself, you may not need the worksheet, and can write and draw on your own paper.

Recommended steps for this activity are:

◉ Choose a digital place from below and screen-record a 5-10-minute exploration of it.

● Create a written "affect inventory" (use the worksheet or above description as a guide) as you go through the place.

● If you're in a group, discuss your experiences with classmates who explored the same world, then with the class as a whole. Did you have similar or different experiences? Notice similar or different things? What choices did the artist make to prompt the experience(s) you had?

◉ Choose a second digital place from below and screen-record a 5-10-minute exploration of it.

● AFTERWARD, reflect on your experience and draw a "sensory map" of your journey. (If need be, you can refer back to your video, but preferably just go by memory).

● If you're in a group, discuss your experiences with classmates who explored the same world, then with the class as a whole. Did you have similar or different experiences? Notice similar or different things? What choices did the artist make to prompt the experience(s) you had?

● This discussion can be extended to critically look at designed places in general. How do the digital places you interact with every day encourage or discourage different feelings and actions? (Remember, a digital place isn't just a 3D world - it's a social media site, a distance-learning classroom, an app, etc.) How do design decisions in physical places such as schools, playgrounds, or different homes encourage or discourage certain experiences?