Reed A. Schwimmer Geological and Marine Sciences First-Year Experience Faculty Development Day August 21, 2006 Redesigning GEO-100 Earth Systems Science

How are courses commonly designed? Make list of content items important to coverage of the field Develop syllabus by organizing items into topical outline Flesh out topical items in lectures, discussions, labs Test knowledge learned in course On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

What’s missing? Articulation of what your students need Articulation of goals beyond content/ coverage goals Deliberate consideration of strategies to achieve goals beyond content goals Plan for evaluation of success On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

An alternative goals-based approach Brings same kind of introspection, intellectual rigor, systematic documentation, and evaluation to teaching that each of us brings to our research Really shakes the tree and designs the course from the bottom up Assessment falls out naturally On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

Step 1: Context and audience The course design process begins with answering the following: Who are my students? What do they need? Can’t set goals effectively until these questions are answered What are the constraints and support structure? On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

Freshmen to seniors Science and non-science majors Course is a requirement or elective Not active learners; they haven’t been taught how to learn GEO-100 Audience

Step 2: Develop overarching goal(s) Teaching is commonly viewed as being teacher-centered Commonly reinforced by how we phrase course goals: “I want to expose my students to….” or “I want to teach my students that…” or “I want to show students that…” On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

Instead…goals can be student- centered “At the end of this course, students will be able to…” What do you want the students to be able to DO at the end of the semester? This focuses beyond the semester – what value has the course added to student lives, abilities, and skill sets? On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

So you don’t want students to… list…explain…calculate… identify…describe…know about… recognize…paraphrase…prepare… On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

Instead, you want to facilitate higher-order thinking tasks derive…predict…analyze… design…interpret…synthesize… formulate…evaluate…create… On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

1.Students will be able to derive the relationships between process and product. 2.Students will be able to synthesize the interactions between different Earth systems (e.g., lithosphere, biosphere, atmosphere). GEO-100 Overall goals

From these goals, course content can then be selected Choose broad content topics that will help you achieve your goals. Then for each topic, select content items that you want the student to master. “How will you give students practice in doing…” You don’t need to cover “everything.” On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty

Chapters are arranged around specific topics, not the connecting processesChapters are arranged around specific topics, not the connecting processes Each chapter is treated as a separate entityEach chapter is treated as a separate entity Not organized to emphasize these connectionsNot organized to emphasize these connections The problem with textbooks

Example of table of contents from an Earth science textbook

Develop the overall goal(s) early and keep focusing on it throughout the course. Use concept maps to illustrate the interrelationships within this goal. Have students demonstrate their understanding by creating concept maps. One solution…

1.Connecting concepts and terms within a topic (within a chapter) 2.Connecting concepts between topics (across chapters) 3.Connecting concepts to the overarching goal (generally not done in textbooks) Three levels of concept maps

warmcool WIND AIR PRESSURE DIFFERENCES HIGHLOW RISING OR FALLING AIR MASSES HL SURFACE AIR TEMP AIR DENSITY CHANGES SUNLIGHT ANGLE AND DURATION SEASONS summerwinter TILT OF EARTH’S AXIS ASTRONOMICALPROCESSES SHAPE OF ORBIT TILT ANGLE AXIS WOBBLE

WIND AIR PRESSURE DIFFERENCES HIGHLOW warmcool RISING OR FALLING AIR MASSES HL SURFACE AIR TEMP AIR DENSITY CHANGES SUNLIGHT ANGLE AND DURATION SEASONS summerwinter TILT OF EARTH’S AXIS ASTRONOMICALPROCESSES SHAPE OF ORBIT TILT ANGLE AXIS WOBBLE Option 1 – Students arrange topics into a flowchart.

warm WIND AIR PRESSURE DIFFERENCES HIGHLOW RISING OR FALLING AIR MASSES HL SURFACE AIR TEMP SUNLIGHT ANGLE AND DURATION SEASONS summerwinter ASTRONOMICALPROCESSES Option 2 – Students describe the connections. AIR DENSITY CHANGES TILT OF EARTH’S AXIS SHAPE OF ORBIT TILT ANGLE AXIS WOBBLE HEAT ENERGY CONC. KINETIC ACTIVITY CONCENTRATION EQUILIBRIUM DIFFUSION

WIND AIR PRESSURE DIFFERENCES RISING OR FALLING AIR MASSES SURFACE AIR TEMP AIR DENSITY CHANGES SUNLIGHT ANGLE AND DURATION SEASONS TILT OF EARTH’S AXIS ASTRONOMICALPROCESSES Option 3 – Students create their own flow chart. Concept SHAPE OF ORBIT TILT ANGLE AXIS WOBBLE HEAT ENERGY CONC. KINETIC ACTIVITY CONCENTRATION EQUILIBRIUM DIFFUSION Connections

Final thoughts… As you enter a classroom, ask yourself this question: “If there were no students in the classroom, could I do what I am planning to do?” If the answer is yes, don’t do it. General Ruben Cubero, Dean of the Faculty, United States Air Force Academy (Novak et al., 1999, Just-in-Time Teaching) On the Cutting Edge Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Same goes for teaching. If the only tool in your teaching toolbox is lecturing, then….