Pedagogy, the art and science of teaching, should be the driving force behind the design of any teaching facility. What is taught and how it is taught should determine the size, type, and configuration of educational space. The statement seems obvious, but often miscommunication and ill-considered compromises can divert a capital project from an institution’s pedagogical mission.
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Many of our fellow citizens believe that creationist claims deserve equal time with evolution in biology class. "After all, isn't evolution just a theory?" The federal government has spent billions on science education over the past 50 years. Curriculum development and teacher training at the pre-college level was supposed to make an impact, but many secondary school science courses are still taught by teachers who may not even have minors in their subjects. Some colleges and universities are considering increasing their science requirements beyond the traditional single semester or year for those who will not major in science, but history suggests that unless we do things differently, the future will be much like the past.
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A survey of 55 colleges showed that the learning environments in introductory science courses are not always as supportive as they should be. Furthermore, most innovative teaching techniques, as recommended by the National Science Education Standards (NRC 1996), are used only occasionally, despite students viewing them as helpful.
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Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) are frequently asked to lead discussion groups. These groups generally take the form of tutorials, review sessions, or problem-based learning classes. In their preparation, what to teach is often emphasized over how to teach. The primary intent of this paper is to provide a few simple teaching strategies for GTAs, but our ideas are germane to any biology educator.
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Instructors used an electronic response system to enhance student-centered learning in large and small college biology classes. The system worked well to engage students in learning the subject matter and to assess their prior knowledge and misconceptions. It provided useful feedback to students as well as instructors. Problems encountered resulted mainly from not having permanent installation of the hardware components in the large class.
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Genomics profoundly affects society, because genome sequence information is widely used in such areas as genetic testing, genomic medicine/vaccine development, and so forth. Therefore, a responsibility to modernize science curricula exists for “post–genome era” educators. At my university, we developed a BS biotechnology program within a liberal arts framework, without major cost or radical curriculum revision. Outcomes have included enrollment growth, interdisciplinary opportunities, enhanced faculty-student research, and modern science laboratories that benefit biotechnology majors and nonscience students.
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On the first day of classes, 81% of students in an introductory biology course claimed that they would submit extra-credit work if given the opportunity. When given two chances for extra-credit work, fewer than one-fourth of students submitted one or both assignments. Students who submitted extra-credit work were more likely to attend class, attend optional help sessions, and earn higher grades than other students, even when the points earned from the extra-credit work were excluded from the calculations of grades. These results indicate that the most successful students use a variety of motivation-related behaviors to maximize their success, and the least successful students often are unwilling to expend the effort necessary to succeed.
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Fellows programs catering to graduate students in the sciences are changing the minds of many and encouraging them to seek roles as teachers. As a society dedicated to improving the teaching and learning of science at the college level, we should be delighted with such efforts. Like the research societies that provide community and fellowship that nurture graduate students and encourage greater involvement in the discipline, we need to nurture graduate students into accepting and participating in teaching as a scholarly discipline.
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Science teachers don't always have to write their own case studies; after all, there are plenty of books that feature science in their plots. This case study uses the book State of Fear as the basis for a discussion of global warming issues.
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