Student Work Examples: Baseball, Deconstructed

Baseball has been described as America's pastime, with an emphasis placed on the mixture of exciting plays, rich cultural background and unique pacing. The game itself can also be thought of as a complex and highly unique information system. As a system, baseball is clearly defined: it has discrete boundaries (rules), a unique set of actions, and clear consequences based on the actions. It is played on a geometrically shaped field, where a visual strategy is critical to winning. And, it has a huge statistical background - scores, facts and figures - which are usually described in the newspaper, on baseball cards or in baseball programs.

Learning this game can be somewhat daunting, as the sport has a unique vocabulary and intricate plays. Baseball, Deconstructed is a project intended to make sense of a huge information system by deconstructing it into various visual and conceptual representations.

Shown: Baseball Deconstructed Concept Map and Process Flow Diagram by Stefanie Danhope-Smith