Northeast Georgia PRISM
Improving Teaching and Learning of Science and Mathematics
at the Undergraduate Level
2004-2005 Grant Awards and Final Reports
In 2004, the Northeast Georgia Partnership for Reform in Science and Mathematics (PRISM) awarded twenty-five grants that provided funds to assist in improving undergraduate instruction in science and mathematics at the University of Georgia and Georgia Perimeter College. The response to the call for proposals was strong and the successful grants were chosen from a set of highly competitive projects. Below are summaries of the innovative projects selected during this first round of funding.
Scaffolding Science Teachers’ Learning through Cases: A Study of Reciprocal Mentoring
Deborah Tippins, dtippins@coe.uga.edu, and Norman Thomson
University of Georgia, College of Education, Science Education
In response to the need for a more situated knowledge base in the preparation of science teachers, Drs. Tippins and Thomson will work with pre-service teachers, middle school science teachers, & university science education faculty in exploring existing science education cases that link theory to practice. Pre-service teachers will also create their own cases. Experienced teachers and university faculty will explore a shared inquiry-based process of “reciprocal mentoring” by providing feedback to the student teachers’ cases and whole group discussion. Final Report
Sea to See: Marine Biology for the Non-Scientist Laboratory Curriculum Development and Outreach
Catherine Teare Ketter, cmscatk@uga.edu
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, School of Marine Sciences
Dr. Catherine Ketter will revise the laboratory manual for the Biology of the Marine Environment, a general introductory course for undergraduates with approximately 350 non-science majors. Dr. Ketter will develop new laboratory exercises using inquiry-based models that can be modified for outreach use in local P-12 schools by the Marine Sciences Graduate Student Association. These new exercises will help students investigate the effects of changing coastal water chemistry parameters for live marine organisms, and will be modified for the creation of portable educational modules (boxed kits and instructional units) to use in K-5 schools and non-profit organizations.
Final Report
Supplemental Instruction as a Teaching Tool in General Chemistry Courses
Jose Gonzalez-Roman, jgonzale@gpc.edu
Georgia Perimeter College, Arts & Sciences, Science Department
In order to improve students’ success in General Chemistry at Georgia Perimeter College’s Lawrenceville campus, Supplemental Instruction (SI) will be implemented this fall. Supplemental Instruction incorporates problem-solving strategies and mathematical skills into the curriculum. SI student leaders will be chosen from an academically advanced group to provide assistance twice per week to help struggling students master the course material. In addition to course content, study skills and related strategies will also be taught. Students will be assessed on their ability to effectively use problem-solving strategies.
Development of an Instructional Manual for Incorporating Engineering and Technology into Georgia’s Elementary Science Program
Tim Foutz, tfoutz@engr.uga.edu and Sid Thompson
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering
The goal for this project is twofold: to incorporate engineering and technology experiences into K-5 science projects and concurrently teach design to engineering majors at UGA. Engineering students will interview students and teachers in Barrow Elementary School to receive input in the development of educational devises that are instructional as well as fun. These devises will incorporate fundamental scientific principles from Georgia’s K-5 curriculum and model the scientific process that engineering students will encounter in the profession. The final product will be a manual of inquiry-based and hands-on projects available on the web that demonstrate the effect of fundamentals of science on engineering and technology to engineering students, and ways to incorporate engineering principles into science for K-5 elementary school teachers. Final Report
Introductory Biology: Designing, Implementing, and Testing an Inquiry-based Laboratory Manual
W. Marshall Darley, darley@plantbio.uga.edu
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Division of Biological Sciences
Dr. Darley will improve student learning, thinking, and knowledge retention in this introduction to organismal biology course, in which 850 science majors enroll annually. Strategies such as inquiry-based instruction, cooperative learning, and reflective writing will be incorporated into a laboratory component for this course. This unusual approach to the lab content – covering organisms by habitat rather than using the standard phylogenetic approach – will provide opportunities for deeper questioning and promote a more meaningful understanding of the organisms. Dr. Darley will also develop a rubric to assess the students’ observations and questions in class, their ability to design and interpret researchable investigations, and their ability to reflect on their own understandings. Final Report
Peer Teaching in Large Freshman Chemistry Classes
Charles H. Atwood, batwood@chem.uga.edu
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Chemistry Department
The goal of this project is to increase student learning and classroom attendance, and to decrease the mid-point withdrawal rate in two Freshman Chemistry classes with 350 students enrolled in each section. Dr. Atwood will modify an NSF-funded project called Peer Led Team Learning to provide more personalized assistance in the form of “peer teachers” on each aisle of the lecture classroom. Thirty sophomores who are carefully selected from previous classes will be asked to attend every lecture and assist the students in “their aisle” by answering questions, correcting mistakes and providing clarifying information. Final Report
Misconception Busters I
Charles H. Atwood, batwood@chem.uga.edu
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Chemistry Department
The goal of this project is to dispel a number of misconceptions that undergraduate students bring with them to beginning Chemistry courses. Basic misconceptions will be identified, and approximately 10 demonstration-based experiments will be created that address misconceptions related to the curriculum. These class demonstrations will be designed to help students reflect on their current beliefs and hopefully change them with ideally one “misconception buster” presented each week. In addition to the short quiz after the demonstration, students will be tested again some time later to assess whether they changed their thinking. Final Report
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Conversion of Non-Majors Introductory Biology Laboratories (BIOL 1103L) from a Cookbook to an Inquiry-based Format
Norris Armstrong, narmstro@uga.edu
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Genetics, Biology Division
The purpose of this project is to change the BIOL-1103L lab sections from cookbook labs to inquiry-based labs. Approximately 1200 undergraduate students enroll in BIOL-1103L each year, many of whom never take another science course. Dr. Armstrong plans to restructure the labs by infusing problem-solving and open-ended experiences into the curriculum. Students will be presented with a problem, asked to identify possible solutions, and then design an experiment to test a hypothesis with expanded lab times. . To expose students to different points of view, they will be required to support their ideas in discussion with their peers. Final Report
La Vida Cotidiana (Everyday Life) in Rural Mexican Schools: The Development of Documentaries for Use in Undergraduate Science Education
Courses at UGA
Lynn A. Bryan, lbryan@coe.uga.edu and Max Lyncee
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
Dr. Lynn Bryan will develop culturally rich documentaries of everyday life in rural Mexican classrooms using video footage that she has collected over the last four years. The documentaries will portray four socio-cultural aspects of classroom instruction and offer critical incidences that depict student responsibility, public performance, cross-age collaboration, and authentic context of instruction. This project will enhance the preparation of prospective science teachers by addressing the need to engage and motivate the growing number of students from diverse backgrounds,
Study of the Effectiveness of Using PRS to Teach Undergraduate Physics
Teman H. Cooke, tcooke@gpc.edu
Georgia Perimeter College - Lawrenceville Campus
College of Arts and Sciences, Science Department
In order to address the problem of passive learning, Dr. Teman Cooke will study the effectiveness of the Personal Response System (PRS) produced by EduCue LLC1. Each student will use a handheld transmitter to respond to a question, and the responses will be collected and tallied by the computer. The immediate feedback can then be used to direct further learning or to implement a form of active learning called Peer Instruction. Dr. Cooke will use the PRS in his Introductory Physics II classes over the year with a mixture of lecture and Peer Instruction techniques. Final Report
Learning Styles of Animal Science Students
Josie Coverdale, jcover@uga.edu and T. Dean Pringle, John Ricketts, & Mark Froetschel
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Science
Department of Animal and Dairy Science
The objectives of this project are to identify the learning styles and backgrounds of students with an interest in Animal Science, and to determine a teaching style that best matches the learning styles of the students. In each of three ADSC courses, students will be randomly assigned to one of two groups, only one of which will be exposed to “hands on” activities. After each lab session, the groups will take a quiz to test their comprehension and a later assessment to measure retention.
Functional Genomics and Bioinformatics in the Undergraduate Classroom:
BTEC4000L
Scott Gold, sgold@uga.edu and Maria Garcia-Pedrajas
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Science
Department of Plant Pathology
The main objective of this project is to enhance student interest and learning by employing laboratory exercises that generate a product of research value. Students will be exposed to and execute hypothesis testing and the scientific method. By the end of the semester, they will have learned how to manipulate DNA sequence data on the computer and to design a deletion construct that will precisely remove an open reading frame (coding gene) of interest within a 50,000 base pair region that they will annotate using bioinformatics tools. Final Report
Molecular Modeling and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy: Simulations for the Organic Chemistry Laboratory
Jose L. Gonzalez-Roman, jgonzale@gpc.edu, Linda Baker lbaker@gpc.edu and the Lawrenceville & Dunwoody Chemistry Department Faculty
Georgia Perimeter College – Lawrenceville Campus
College of Arts and Sciences, Science Department
In order to include molecular modeling and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy into Organic Chemistry, a new course module for the lab curriculum will be developed. By constructing molecular models, it is possible to get a better understanding of bond lengths and the geometrical shape of molecules. NMR spectroscopy determines the number, kind, and relative locations of certain atoms. ChemDraw is a computer software program that will allow the introduction of both of these concepts in the Organic Chemistry laboratory, thereby giving students new hands-on experiences in addressing structural type questions in Organic Chemistry. Final Report
The Development of a “Hands On” Curriculum for Geography 1112L: An Introduction to Weather and Climate Laboratory Sections
Andrew Grundstein, andrewg@uga.edu and Joshua Durkee & Sharon Ashley
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Science
Department of Geography
New exercises designed for GEOG 1112L, which serves approximately 300-400 students a year, will examine the role of water, energy, and weather systems in our Earth-Atmosphere system. These new laboratory assignments will be created to take advantage of available meteorological instrumentation and encourage more direct student participation in the learning process. The new curriculum would be more “hands on” where students actively participate by collecting, analyzing, and discussing the meteorological data they collected. Final Report
Enhancing Undergraduate Geography Courses with Data-Intensive Multimedia Modules: The Ozone Hole and El Nino
John A. Knox, John_Andrew_Knox@yahoo.com and Ned Gardiner
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Science
Department of Geography
Dr. John Knox will create two new course modules for undergraduate geography courses that address two key topics of climate change: 1) the ozone hole, representing anthropogenic climate change; and 2) the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a pattern of natural climate variability that periodically alters weather and climate patterns in locations all over the world, including Georgia. These products will benefit hundreds of UGA students each year and could be incorporated into laboratory sections in the Department of Geography to extend their impact on both students and curriculum at UGA. Final Report
Mentoring Experiences of Science Education Student Teachers
Tom Koballa, tkoballa@coe.uga.edu and Leslie Upson
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
The purpose of Dr.Tom Koballa’s project is to analyze and improve the student teaching experiences of science teacher education students. The goals of the project are to develop benchmarks to support the teaching practices, and analyze the effectiveness of benchmarks & evidence-based tools. The evidence-based tools that will be used are available through the Evidence-Based Inquiry (EBI) system, which is a suite of web-based tools that incorporate multimedia data capture, storage, and retrieval.
Final Report
Analyzing and Improving Lesson Assessment Benchmarks for Science Teaching
Tom Koballa, tkoballa@coe.uga.edu
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
Lesson Assessment Benchmarks (LABs), which were developed by Dr. Tom Koballa last spring, will be analyzed and improved. LABs highlight 13 key features of lesson assessment. The goals of the project are to evaluate the usefulness of LABs based on student feedback, make improvements to the LABs that will enhance their usefulness in analyzing the lesson assessment practices of science teacher education students, and create prototype science teacher education course materials that can be used to illustrate a range of lesson assessment practices. Final Report
Active Learning and Peer Teaching in GEOG 1111, 1111L, Introduction to Physical Geography
Vernon Meentemeyer, vmeente@uga.edu and Kavita Pandit
University of Georgia, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences
Department of Geography
In two sections of GEOG 1111L, two laboratory modules will be revised to use primarily critical thinking/active learning methods. Revisions of the modules, and trials of those revisions, will be conducted in the first two weeks of the Spring Semester by a team consisting of Dr. Vernon Meentemeyer, a doctoral level TA, and two undergraduate TAs. Each year about 1300 students enroll in the GEOG 1111 lecture sections and about 38-40% will also enroll in GEOG 1111L. Therefore, the potential impact of peer instruction and active learning is substantial. Final Report
Evaluating the Effectiveness of Pre-Service Secondary Science Teachers’ Reflective Portfolios
Cynthia C. Minchew, cminchew@coe.uga.edu and Lynn A. Bryan
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
This project will evaluate reflective, professional portfolios created by students enrolled in the Reflection on Science Teaching course. Researchers will examine the types of program experiences reflected in the portfolios that students believe were important to their understanding and knowledge of teaching. They will also examine whether or not these experiences achieve the goals set by the NSTA and the Department of Science Education Secondary program. The data that is collected and analyzed will be used to modify ESCI 5470 and to inform needed changes in UGA’s secondary science education program. Final Report
Molecular Modeling, Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy, and Mechanism in the Organic Curriculum
Glenn S. Nomura, gnomura@gpc.edu and the Lawrenceville & Dunwoody Chemistry Department Faculty
Georgia Perimeter College – Dunwoody Campus
Arts and Sciences, Science Department
During the 2004-2005 academic year, the Georgia Perimeter College faculty at the Lawrenceville Campus and at the Dunwoody Campus will cooperate in the standardized usage of the ChemOffice Pro 2004 software for course development in organic chemistry lectures and labs at each campus. New teaching materials and tests will be created in an editable form for faculty to share. These shared modules would facilitate student learning in these challenging topics, and they would assist in the standardization of organic chemistry content in similar courses throughout the regents system. Topics include, but are not limited to, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), molecular modeling, and mechanism.
Using Our Gifts
Jason B. Peake, jpeake@tifton.uga.edu and John Ricketts, Dennis Duncan, & Ray Herren
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Science
Department of Agricultural leadership, Education, and Communication
In response to the increase in student population on the Tifton Campus, UGA research faculty have volunteered to serve as instructors for the undergraduate courses, which is an unfamiliar role for many who have not received training in instructional methodologies. This project will address that need by offering approximately twenty faculty members five one-hour workshops that will be conducted by outstanding high school science teachers. There will be a brief overview of research supporting various teaching methodologies, followed by demonstrations of best teaching practices. A longitudinal study of the teaching practices of the Tifton faculty along with a longitudinal study of student satisfaction with course instruction will be part of the evaluation process.
Supporting a New Course Utilizing Agriculture as the Context for Developing Inquiry-based Methods in Science and Math for Future Teachers
John Ricketts, jcr@uga.edu and Jason Peake, Dennis Duncan, & Frank Flanders
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Science
Department of Agricultural leadership, Education, and Communication
A new undergraduate course, entitled Agricultural Science for Teachers, will teach approximately 30 future teachers concepts from science and math using contextual, inquiry-based, and experiential-based strategies. This project will provide support for this course through integrated research and education activities that include: designing and implementing innovative laboratory experiences; supporting teacher preparation and enhancement; researching pedagogy; and providing research opportunities. Agriculture and Science Education experts from Georgia and across the Southeast will assist with teaching some of the interactive lab activities.
Examining and Enhancing Undergraduate Pre-service Science Teachers’ Understanding of the Nature of Science
Eulsun Seung, esseung@uga.edu and Lynn A. Bryan
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
This project combines a small-scale research study in a pre-service undergraduate science education course with the creation of an instructional module aimed at enhancing pre-service science teachers’ understanding of the nature of science. Middle grades science teachers’ understandings about the nature of science will be examined. Based on the findings, there may be suggestions for modifying the syllabus or designing an instructional module to enhance prospective teachers’ understanding about the nature of science. The module would then be piloted in a pre-service middle grades science education course, and the resultant student learning about the nature of science would be evaluated.
Final Report
Integrating Experiential Learning into Food Chemistry
Robert L. Shewfelt, shewfelt@uga.edu and Janet Sylvia & Amy Rowley
University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Science
Department of Food Science and Technology
In the food chemistry course FDST 4040, in-class lectures will be replaced with experiential learning exercises designed to meet specific learning outcomes for the course. Students will be expected to watch thirty automated web-based lectures outside of class in order to free up twenty minutes of class time for a proven technique to stimulate and assess experiential learning. The teaching goals, classroom assessment techniques, and active learning strategies for each segment were selected to align with the learning outcomes which had been previously selected. Final Report
Investigating the Conversations of University Supervisors and Student Interns in Science Education
Leslie Upson, lupson@uga.edu
University of Georgia, College of Education
Department of Mathematics and Science Education
The overarching goal of this project is to investigate the current practices of university supervisors in the science education department and the perceptions of the intern teachers with whom they work. Using these data as a starting point, Dr. Leslie Upson will improve the training of supervisors within the department so that practices are more closely aligned with documents related to the preparation of teachers such as the GSTEP Framework and the National Science Teachers’ Association’s Standards for New Teacher Preparation. The results of the project will be shared during a college-wide colloquium which will occur during early April 2005, as well as in a journal article.
