XRchaeology at Miller Grove

The Miller Grove WebApp consists of virtual, augmented, interactive Online GIS and mixed reality learning components. It is designed to be used in conjunction with the place-based education lesson plans focused on the Underground Railroad in southern Illinois. The materials available here were built as part of a collaborative project between History Beneath the Forest Floor: African American Heritage Archaeological Field School at Miller Grove [co-Directors: Mary McCorvie and Mark J. Wagner], and SIU Field School, Center for Archaeological Investigations, Educating with Evidence project, Center for Teaching Excellence and Shawnee National Forest. The XR materials made freely available for educational use bring to life a simulated version of the nineteenth-century Free African American community of Miller Grove in southern Illinois.

XRchaeology at Miller Grove is a web-based collection of custom new media components (digital storytelling, GIS, virtual tours, 3D objects, and web-based VR) developed through a collaboration between the Center for Archaeological Investigations, Educating with Evidence, and the Center for Teaching Excellence at SIU. These components can be used alone or combined to supplement lesson plans focusing on antebellum-era Free African American communities. Miller Grove was a free African American community in southern Illinois with ties to the Underground Railroad.