Domesday Discs - 1986

The BBC's Domesday Disc project appeared in 1986.

It involved students collecting data, and adding to a digital laser disc the size of an old LP, which was read using a special reader, and navigated using a tracker ball which could be rotated by the hands. The final product was quite costly to purchase - a real investment for a school. I believe the price included the BBC Micro that was required to run the associated software and hardware.

Initially estimated to require the involvement of 10,000 schools and about one million children, the intention was to make the role of schools central in a data gathering project that would assign each school to a geographical area, have parents and local societies collect data, with the schools "acting as a focus and providing the computer". Questionnaires about geography, amenities and land use were to be completed, with school pupils and other contributors also able to write about their local area and "the issues affecting them" in their own words

Source: Wikipedia

As with the Land Utilisation Surveys of Stamp and Coleman, students were involved in its production and data collection, and it was a BBC project aimed at commemorating the 900th anniversary of the original 'Domesday' survey of 1086 ordered by William the First of England.

I still have one of the discs - although not the player and tracker ball to make use of it. There was an also an EcoDisc based on Slapton Ley which we also had in my geography department.

This website provides further details on the project.

There is an article from former GA President Margaret Roberts on the use of the Community Disc in an issue of 'Teaching Geography' from 1990. An early contribution to TG from Margaret.

I remember some external organisation coming in and filming me demonstrating the discs - I wonder what that was for, and whether it still exists somewhere - it would be wonderful to see it as I was fresh into my teaching career....

References:

Roberts, Margaret. “Locations, Lines and Areas: Exploring the Community Disc in the BBC Domesday System.” Teaching Geography, vol. 15, no. 1, 1990, pp. 17–18. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/23752172. Accessed 23 Sept. 2023.

National Archives detail: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C16160

https://www.atsf.co.uk/dottext/domesday.html

Some of the resources that came from the project:

Research Paper (Open Access)

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232993632_The_Domesday_Project--an_educational_review

The BBC later produced two further discs: an EcoDisc and one on Volcanoes.

I remember seeing them both - and also the very detailed instruction manuals.

A web based version existed for a while with an update for places in 2011. It's now on the National Archive site.

And a video of it in action:

Keen to hear from anyone who has memories of using the BBC Domesday Discs.