Creating ecological dynamics in the classroom through the use of learnercentered teaching activities

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Creating ecological dynamics in the classroom
through the use of learner-centered
teaching activities
Loren B. Byrne Roger Williams University,
Bristol, RI
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The challenges of education

• Improving students understanding, retention
• critical thinking skills
• Developing effective teaching methods
• learning environments
• engaged, attentive, reflective students
• dynamic, energized classrooms

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The challenges of education
I hear and I forget I see and I remember I do
and I understand. --Kung Fu-Tse

• Questioning overcoming the sage on the stage
  method
• learning by seeing listening
• emphasis on teacher-content relationship

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A challenge of ecological education
Ecology environmental issues are
complex perhaps too overwhelming
for most people to quickly easily
comprehend
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A challenge of ecological education

• How can we teach most effectively teach ecology?
  
• esp. to disinterested, distracted students
• non-ecologist majors and non-majors

• How do we capture students attention and
• keep it long enough so they
• contemplate ecological complexity
• develop basic ecoliteracy
• see the world in new ways?

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Ecology of the classroom
Learner-centered teaching philosophy

• Focus on relationships
• between each student content
• Students actively assess create
• their own understanding
• hands-on activities ? minds-on learning

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Ecology of the classroom
A more ecologically dynamic classroom Students
are active talking, asking questions, gathering
information, reflecting on what they do and
dont know Teacher becomes director
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3 learner-centered ecology activities

• Food web role-playing
• 2. Creating a biogeochemical
• cycle diagram
• 3. Debating conservation biology
  human-environment relationships

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1. Food web role playing exercise
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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Learning Objectives
• examine direct indirect trophic linkages in a
  community
• understand how energy moves through a food web
• appreciate greater complexity of webs than chains

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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Preparation
• List 10-12 organisms (or resources) in a food
  web

Detritus-based soil web
Dead leaf Deer dung Bacterial cell Fungal
hyphae Nematode (bactivorous and/or
fungivorous) Collembolan Oribatid mite Wolf
spider Earthworm Robin
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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Preparation
• List 10-12 organisms (or resources) in a food
  web
• Write the name of each organism on index card
• One card for each student
• groups of 10-12
• more than one web per class?

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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Day 1 in class
• Intro discussion of food chains webs,
  trophic levels
• Assign students an organism that they will
  become
• Pass out index cards
• Homework assignment
• google organism
• fill in index cards

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1. Food web role playing exercise
Homework assignment create a sketch of
yourself investigate your trophic
level write 1 cool fact
Side 2
Side 1
What you eat What eats you One cool fact
about me
Student drawing here
Name of organism
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1. Food web role playing exercise
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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Day 2 in class
• Students in the same web gather
• Each must find their preferred food
• before being eaten by another
• asking others who they are
• or looking at cards

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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Day 2 in class
• Students pair up in
• trophic relationships
• Variation
• They exchange candy as
• an exchange of energy
• Who has the most candy, wins!

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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Procedure
• Day 2 in class
• After trophic links made,
• students create a
• food web diagram
• Attach note cards to poster
• Draw arrows
• Teacher asks questions

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1. Food web role playing exercise

• Follow-up discussion
• Biomass pyramids 2nd law
• Trophic cascades indirect effects
• Biodiversity loss
• Ecosystem services (e.g. pest control)

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Student feedback
What did you learn by completing the food web
activity in last class?
By removing one part of the food web, the whole
food web changes.
That even the smallest organism such as fungus
impacts the entire ecosystem.
Can this model be applied to globalization
today?
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2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram
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2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram

• Learning Objectives
• recognize major pools and fluxes of elements
• understand how they are interconnected in an
  ecosystem at global scale
• provide foundation for discussion of climate
  change sustainability

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2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram

• Procedure
• Day 1 in class
• Intro discussion

• Why is C important?
• What are pools and fluxes of a BGC cycle?

• Pools the different molecular forms of C
• Fluxes the names of the processes that
• transform one pool of C into
  another

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Pool Flux Pool
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2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram

• Procedure
• Day 1 in class
• Intro discussion
• Homework assignment
• Read C cycle article on Wikipedia
• Create list of pools and fluxes and take notes

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Your task Create a C Cycle diagram
2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram

• Procedure
• Day 2 in class
• working in groups
• step by step instructions

• Compare your pools fluxes lists with your group
  members and generate a master list.

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Creating a C Cycle diagram

• 2. Add missing pools to your list from those
  below
• CO2
• CH4
• Plant biomass
• Herbivore biomass
• Carnivore biomass
• Dead biomass
• Detritivore biomass

Soil C Fossil Fuels CaCO3 Biocarbonate
(ocean) Biocarbonate (terrestrial) Dead biomass
(ocean) Carbonate (ocean) Phytoplankton Marine
shells Consumer biomass (ocean)
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3. Label each oval with the name of a pool.
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4. Label each arrow with the name of a flux.
5. Cut the pools and fluxes out. 6. Arrange
them into a C cycle diagram.
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Atmosphere
Ozone depletion
photosynthesis
deforestation
photosynthesis
cows
dissolution
outgassing
respiration
1 ? consumption
death
consumption
death
burial
consumption
death
Run-off (erosion)
CFCs
2? consumption
volcanic eruption
sequestration
Ocean
coalification
Biosphere
Consumer biomass
sedimentation
combustion
Concrete formation
death
weathering
Lithosphere
lithification
oilificatation
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2. Biogeochemical cycle diagram

• Follow-up discussion
• Human effects on global C cycle
• Global climate change

In 2006, 8.4 gigatons of C were put into the
atmosphere from fossil fuel combustion
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Student feedback
I liked when we did the carbon cycle, it
allowed me to see it visually and ask questions
if I didnt understand something.
What was effective for your learning? The
group projects where we have to put a chart or
diagram together force you to think about the
topic which was very effective.
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Student feedback
Non-major students journal entry
Before learning about the carbon cycle in class
and doing the hands-on activity, I never realized
how complex the carbon cycle was and how many
relationships were involved in it. After
learning about it I can see how (the pools) all
relate and how one change in the cycle has a
ripple of effects to other parts of the cycle.
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3. Con bio human-env relations
A real world judicial-ethical debate
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3. Con bio human-env relations

• Learning Objectives
• understand roles of ethics values in
  conservation
• recognize tension among multiple perspectives
  about
• human-environment relations
• improve analytical debate skills

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3. Con bio human-env relations
The scenario
James M. Stevenson
The feral cats
The piping plover
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3. Con bio human-env relations

• Homework assignment
• Read news article describing case
• List arguments for convicting or acquitting the
  man
• Which do you favor and why?

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Trial Begins for Bird-Watching Expert in a Cat
Killing
New York Times, November 14, 2007
the cat had a name, Mama Cat, and she lived
under a toll bridge, she was fed and cared for by
a toll collector. Whether the cat was feral
is the critical point in this case. Mr. Stevenson
was indicted under a state law that prohibited
killing a cat belonging to another.
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Trial Begins for Bird-Watching Expert in a Cat
Killing
New York Times, November 14, 2007
In her opening statement, a Galveston DA told
the jury that Mr. Stevenson shot that animal in
cold blood and that the cat died a slow and
painful death gurgling on its own blood.
The defense argued that Mr. Stevenson kill(ed) a
wild animal that was preying on endangered piping
plovers.
This is about wild species disappearing from
your planet. I did what I had to do.
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3. Con bio human-env relations

• Problems
• Should Mr. Stevenson be convicted or acquitted?
• What reasoning guides your decision?

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3. Con bio human-env relations

• Procedure
• In class
• Group students into 4-5s
• Give each a card with convict or acquit
• They must debate for the decision on their card
• Can minds be changed or will juries be
  deadlocked?
• Come together and vote as full class

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3. Con bio human-env relations

• Follow-up discussion
• Was the cat feral or owned?
• Which species has more rights cat or plover?
• Is killing justified to save individuals of one
  species?
• What law protects the plovers?

So what happened?
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Judge Declares a Mistrial in Texas Cat Killing
Case
New York Times, November 17, 2007
They had voted 8 to 4 in favor of conviction
but were hopelessly deadlocked. A juror To
look at the pictures, the cat didnt look feral.
It could have been my cat at home. Another He
admitted that he took the law into his own hands.
He didnt have the right to do that. The law
was changed Killing any cat is now illegal.
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A learner-centered,
ecologically dynamic classroom

• Conclusions
• Hands-on activities created a more energized
  classroom with engaged students
• Student feedback indicates effectiveness
• New appreciation for socio-ecological complexity