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Hi HTTO class!

In this space we, as a class, are going to construct a sheet of possible assignments for the use of wikis, blogs, or discussion forums in a science course. Come up with one example and describe it below like this...


 * Author**: Stephen Thomas
 * Tool**: Wiki
 * Description**: Students will be given an assignment to describe an activity with a digital tool that promotes active discussion/collaboration with students. They will then compile these in a wiki have the chance to edit other people's entries adding internet resources. The end product will be a list of a dozen approaches / tools for them to use in future classes.

Now you try :) CLICK HERE to see how to edit this wiki


 * Author:** Megan Woltz
 * Tool:** Ecological footprint calculator
 * Description:** The Ecological footprint calculator at www.myfootprint.org could be used to teach students in an undergrad ecology class about the global ecological impacts of their everyday decisions. Students answer a series of questions about their lifestyles and the calculator estimates how many Earths it would take to support everyone on the planet living that same lifestyle. It compares the student's result in each category to the US average. Students can then post to discussion forums: 1) about what surprised them about their footprints, 2) suggesting ways to reduce their footprints, 3) debating the most efficient ways to reduce the US footprint.

This could be really eye-opening for both ecologically-minded students and the ones who have never even thought about it. I just did this and even though I'm very sustainability conscious (vegetarian diet, recycle/compost everything, tiny car, 2nd-hand everything, don't replace electronics until they are absolutely dead) and I was well below the US average footprint for all categories, it would still take almost 3 earths for everyone on the planet to live like me. Students can learn on their own by playing with the calculator - for each question it shows you how your footprint increases or decreases with different answers, so you can think about how much of a difference it would make if you drove a compact instead of a midsize car. There are also links below most questions providing info about how to reduce your footprint in that particular area. Exploring the links and playing with the options should provide lots of fodder for discussion.

// Possible edit from Jessica: (Hoping I read the objectives correctly!) In the class I TAed for we had the students actually develop a water footpring calculator for the average college student. So I think your idea here is great and really helps students understand their impact on the environment. So maybe a possible addition to this project would be to have them form their own calculator after calculating their ecological footprint. What is maybe an additional element that is needed in a footprint calculator that was not already done in this site? How might a college student's calculator be different from an adult outside of the college? If the students are working in a group (even if this is for an online class, it could possibly still be done), they might need to discuss the variation between students living on-campus and off-campus or even the different in gender. Just some things to also consider. But by having the students try to create a calculator in addition to playing with an already made calculator, this can help increase understanding of the importance of an ecological footprint calculator. Or something like that! Overall, nice tool and idea! :) //


 * Author**: Allie Holschbach
 * Tool**: Wiki
 * Description**: Students will be asked to peruse the 3-dimensional brain model provided by PBS ([]). After their exploration, there will be staggered due dates for their graded participation in the Wiki. All graded responses will be initialed by the author, but additional anonymous entries are permitted so long as they don’t violate the class’s established agreement of mutual respect.

In the first half of their assignment, students will comment under each of the Wiki’s headings, which will include: 1) //Exploring by Area vs Function:// which makes more sense to you and why? 2) //Class vs PBS… vs you//: choose one area or function that was covered in class and by the 3-D model. Compare and contrast the information from these two sources then write your own description, citing sources as needed. 3) //New challengers//: describe at least one weakness of the 3-D model provided. Then find an alternative online tool that you think provides a better depiction of the brain and its functions and share the link with your classmates in the Wiki.

In the second half of their assignment, students will provide thoughtful responses to at least one comment in each of the first two sections and visit each of the models provided by their classmates in the third section. Finally, students will cast a vote for the very best online model for understanding brain structures and functions. The winning model will be shared with the full class in the next lecture, with an optional shout-out to the student who found it.


 * Author:** Jessica Caton
 * Tool:**Project NOAH and Explore.org
 * Description: [I decided to talk about two tools as they are somewhat similar but could be useful for two different types of assignments]**

The mobile application and digital tool Project NOAH ( http://www.projectnoah.org/) is used to record and share nature sightings. This tool can be used for education by acting as a field and identification guide on local vegetation and wildlife. Before this assignment begins, Project NOAH will have to be introduced with a quick tutorial on how to use it. Each student should also sign up for an account on the website.

For the purposes of this assignment, students will be asked to take a trip to the Red Cedar River (near the south entrance of the Administration Building . During this trip, students will have to complete multiple components for the assignment. First, the students will need to record their first observations on looking around the river. What type of abiotic and biotic factors do they observe? What species of wildlife are present? How many visitors are frequenting the area?

After these general observations are collected, the student will have to pick a plant species and an animal species to capture a picture for Project NOAH. On uploading this image to the application, any specific description or classification should be identified along with a geotag for the location. Students may find it helpful to glance around Project NOAH at other pictures found in the similar area for help with identification. The student should separately describe how the plant and animal species is interacting with the environment. How is human disturbance possibly promoting or interfering with this plant and animal species' behavior and survival? Other exploratory questions relating to the behavior and ecology of the organism should also be addressed here.

A second assignment (almost more like a project idea) can also be created using http://explore.org, a website containing a large number of webcams recording video of animals around the world. This assignment will be considered practice working with ethograms and applying it to webcam video footage. The student will have learned how to create an ethogram prior to this assignment. The student will select an animal to watch (from the videos available on Explore.org). The student will have to find one scientific article on this species that will hopefully be helpful in understanding the behavior of this selected animal. Students should try to create the ethogram before watching the webcam footage, but it might be necessary to create an efficient ethogram while watching a few clips. After the ethogram is fully developed, the student will watch and code two twenty-minute periods of footage to observe behaviors present. This ethogram will then be analyzed by the student to see the duration each behavior occurred during observation. The student will then be asked similar questions to the Project NOAH activity like how is this animal species interacting with the environment, is human disturbance affecting the animal's behavior, etc.


 * Author ** : Christina Ragan
 * Tool ** : Blog
 * Description ** : Students will identify pop culture/current event references of various Neuroscience topics. Once identified, students will then explain and summarize the main findings of the reference. Then, students will critique not only the journalist's interpretation of the evidence, but also how the original author conducted their research. Other students in the class can offer up their responses to the blog post. To encourage readership, students will follow and link to each other's blogs so that a great audience can be achieved.

// Possible edit from Jessica: (Hoping I read the objectives correctly!) In the class I TAed for last semester we had the students do an exercise very similar to this. What you might want to do is have the students find not only a pop culture event references but then find a scientific article about a similar topic. This helped students see the difference between scholarly and non-scholarly work. In addition, it helped them understand when it might be useful to get information from either source. One thing that was mentioned was how credible the work was in a non-scholarly article. However, the non-scholarly article is easier to understand... and so on. So maybe adding this element of scientific journals in addition to a pop culture reference would provide a next step to working on a project related to Neuroscience. And at least the students would get hooked with the topic from the pop culture reference. Just an idea! :) I love the addition of the blog post! //


 * Author:** Bradley Hammond
 * Tool:** Wiki/discussion forum
 * Description:** I largely had the same thought as Christina, but with different aspects. I would use wikis in conjunction with discussion forums as a way to run a journal club. Primary literature would be posted every week and a different student would have to take "lead" when discussing the journal article. The "lead" student would then be required to make a wiki that was sufficient to lead other students through the journal article. Midway through the week, the wiki would need to be completed, and a discussion forum would be opened up to discuss the article. The non-lead students would be encouraged to use the wiki as both a guide and a discussion point.