Chapman students presenting physical geology research projects to AP Environmental Science class, Orange High School Bringing Research into Your Classroom Chris Kim Schmid College of Science and Techology

Why have your students do research in the classroom?

Considerations: What types of projects lend themselves well to classroom research? How much time will it take? How much time do you have? What are your students capable of doing? What resources do you need? What aspects of your own research can you bring into the classroom? Can your students help you advance your research?

Tips for structuring a project for effective learning Set well-defined goals – Make sure students see value in the project Have students complete project in stages Provide regular/frequent feedback Anticipate setbacks Incorporate some aspect of peer review or collaboration

Student-Initiated Research Projects in the Classroom What are some characteristics/considerations of student- initiated research projects?

Student-Initiated Research Projects in the Classroom Can range from: Intro to advanced/capstone level Few weeks to full semester Individual to group to full-class projects Primarily student-initiated and designed Greatly benefit from: Multiple deadlines Peer, professor feedback Clear rubrics, templates and evaluation forms

Timeframes and Deadlines Include in syllabus (with % grade allocation) Clearly indicate timeframe of project Provide multiple deadlines (with point allocations): Project proposal/outline (suggesting >1 idea gives more flexibility) Detailed experimental method Initial results Full draft Final report/presentation Additional updates as necessary TEMPLATES can help considerably!

The value (and effort) of revisions Students’ experience with writing (reports) ≠ the real academic writing process Revisions: Reflect the actual writing process Provide a more sophisticated, higher quality result Take proportionally much more time Can leverage peer evaluations to lessen faculty time

Classroom research examples Physical geology (General Education class): “Work in groups of no more than 4 to develop and conduct a geologically-relevant experiment using techniques and concepts covered in ENV 111.” Inorganic chemistry (majors course): “You will be sampling water sources around Chapman University and analyzing them for dissolved metal content as a function of selected variables.” Environmental science and policy capstone (senior project): See CURQuarterly online, Summer 2014 “The goal of this senior capstone course will involve the design, research, analysis, presentation, and publication of Chapman University's first campus environmental audit.”

Presenting results: discussion Oral vs. poster vs. paper Peer evaluation vs. faculty evaluation Internal presentations vs. to other groups (student research day, local high schools) Individually vs. as a group

Chapman students present physical geology research projects to AP Environmental Science class, Orange High School

Chapman students present physical geology research projects to AP Environmental Science class, Orange High School

Inorganic Chemistry research poster

1 st env. science senior capstone course Spring 2013

Audit launch, Chapman Univ., May 2013 Audit presentation, CA Higher Education Sustainability Conference, UCSB, June 2013