I can’t believe it’s not butter…

by Stephanie Chasteen on May 12, 2012

… but I have no way of knowing until I open it.

Sorry, I don’t have any credit for this one!  A random forward from a friend.

Post to Twitter Post to Yahoo Buzz Post to Delicious Post to Digg Post to Facebook Post to Reddit Post to StumbleUpon

{ 0 comments }

I just came back from the University of Oregon, in beautiful Eugene, where I did a series of workshops and talks.  Here are the materials and slides from those talks, for anyone interested in these materials.

What every teacher should know about cognitive research.

This talk looks at some of the findings from cognitive psychology that have been of particular interest to us here in Colorado (or, perhaps more specifically, to me):

  • Dan Schwartz’s work on creating a “time for telling” in lecture using contrasts to orient students to key features
  • Various researchers’ work on the importance of context and prior knowledge, and how it can help or hinder learning
  • Kornell, Bjork, and others’ work on the importance of testing and retrieval for memorization

There are a few other threads in the slide presentation that I didn’t get a chance to cover (though did discuss with some interested graduate students after the talk).

Here are the handouts:  Handouts.pdf

A few discussion points came up during the talk, and here are some literature references related to those discussions:

  1. A nice review of the different kinds and causes of student motivation.  See particularly the summary table (I think it’s Table 2).  This table would make an excellent group discussion jumping-off-point.  Pintrich-motivation-review.pdf
  2. Are simulations better than real equipment, when, and should they be used before or after a hands-on lab?    A discussion of research in this area is on the research area of the PhET website.    A particularly often-cited publication is When learning about the real world is better done virtually: a study of substituting computer simulations for laboratory equipment .
  3. There is no evidence for learning styles (e.g., visual vs auditory learners).  Rather , the bulk of evidence seems to suggest that presenting material in multiple modes, or in a mode that suits the particular content at hand, is best.  The review suggesting this is here:  Pashler et al. review of learning styles.  One of the few studies that directly looks at learning styles (and finds no effect) is this study by Massa and Mayer, And I have also produced a short podcast on this research on my Learning About Teaching Physics podcast.

Below are the slides.

Speaking of Science:  The Art of Science Communication

I also gave a talk about some of the major themes in effective science communication.  This led to a particularly good discussion on how some of these ideas still apply in academic writing and talks — one needs to weave a story, use clear transitions between paragraphs, and make ones’ motivation for the study clear.  Narrative structure IS how we understand content?  Unfortunately you can’t hear the great pieces of audio that I played to make my point, but I’m always happy to share them.

Here are the handouts:  Speaking of Science-handout

We mentioned some useful resources:

  1.  Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
  2. Don’t Be Such a Scientist: Talking Substance in an Age of Style
  3. And for communicating about controversial issues:  The Psychology of Climate Change Communication (pdf download)

Here are the slides:

The nonlinear dynamics of a career in science education

Lastly, I gave a talk for the University of Oregon Women in Science group about my rather unusual career, careening from physics research to science journalism, museum work, education research, and now consulting services.

Here is a previous blog post that I wrote about my career.

We discussed a bit the way that working for grades, rather than for intrinsic rewards, can be a real hindrance in a career.  An “A” can be a validation of self-worth, whereas a “C” is taken as a sign of personal failure.  This was contrasted to an approach where a “C” just means that you need to work harder next time.  There’s quite a bit of research showing that the second approach is much more productive.  This is based on research by Dweck, and is called “fixed vs. growth mindset”.  A really useful Scientific American article about this research, and how you can avoid this in your kids, is here:  Dweck_SciAm11-07_The_Secret_to_Raising_Smart_Kids.pdf

The slide show is here:

Post to Twitter Post to Yahoo Buzz Post to Delicious Post to Digg Post to Facebook Post to Reddit Post to StumbleUpon

{ 0 comments }

Writing Great Clicker Questions (FTEP; Mar 2012)

April 18, 2012

I forgot to upload the slides and handouts from last month’s Faculty Teaching Excellence Program presentation on Writing Great Clicker Questions.  As usual, you can find all my past presentations on the “presentations” tab, so you can find the materials from a workshop that you’ve attended, or check out the various workshops that I can [...]

Read the full article →

Speaking of Physics… The Art of Science Communication

April 13, 2012

Yesterday I gave a short presentation to our graduate student group here at the University of Colorado, to discuss my background in science writing and education, and share some best-practices in communication and writing that they can use with the public, or with colleagues.  One thing that I often find when reading academic papers or [...]

Read the full article →

Workshop: Engaging students with clickers “best practices”

April 10, 2012

Today I co-presented a workshop on clicker best-practices with i>clicker representative Dustin Jensen. Classroom response systems (“clickers”) offer a powerful way to increase student engagement by going beyond simple quizzes. They provide an opportunity to gather real-time feedback on student understanding. If you are new to clickers or need fresh ideas for using clickers in [...]

Read the full article →

This is what a scientist looks like

April 3, 2012

I just found out about a pretty neat new Tumblr project, posting pictures of “real scientists”, to paint the picture of the diversity that is the lab-coated set.  It’s really fun to look through:  This is what a scientist looks like. I just submitted my photo, not sure how long it takes for them to [...]

Read the full article →

Interactive “scale of the universe” visualization

March 28, 2012

A friend just forwarded me this very neat visualization on the web:  The Scale of the Universe 2.  Just to give you a taste, here’s a screenshot.  But you should really go in and fiddle around. It’s quite fun.  The only negative point that I’ve got is that once you’ve zoomed in, there’s no way [...]

Read the full article →

Frank Oppenheimer lab setup at CU Boulder

March 21, 2012

I blogged earlier about the wonderful must-read book, “Something Incredibly Wonderful Happens,” about Frank Oppenheimer’s philosophy of science education and exploration, and his eventual founding of the best place on earth, the Exploratorium.  You can see another review of the book on the blog Bioephemera, and read the first chapter of the book here. Below [...]

Read the full article →

Physics for Future Presidents

March 18, 2012

Richard Muller gave one of the plenaries at the AAPT Winter Meeting, and it was one of the more useful sessions of the conference for me.  Richard Muller is the teacher of an influential course at UC Berkeley called Physics and Technology for Future Presidents: An Introduction to the Essential Physics Every World Leader Needs [...]

Read the full article →

FTEP “Effective facilitation of clickers” workshop

March 16, 2012

I just gave a workshop, along with Steve Pollock, for our faculty teaching excellent program at CU-Boulder on how to effectively facilitate clicker questions in the classroom. I love giving this particular workshop — working on writing questions themselves is fun, but here is where we get to get into the nitty-gritty of how to [...]

Read the full article →

Population, Consumption, and Climate: A conversation with Al Bartlett

March 14, 2012

Al Bartlett is a celebrated physics educator, and he’s right here in Boulder.  One of the things he’s well-known for is a talk that he’s been giving since the 1960′s on the simple arithmetic of population growth, and what this means for our planet.  I’ve seen that talk — Arithmetic, Population and Energy:  Sustainability 101 [...]

Read the full article →

Large lecture inquiry: How to engage students in the practices of science

March 11, 2012

I’m behind in my blogging from the AAPT Winter Meeting, but better late than never. I had the pleasure of meeting Fred Goldberg at this meeting, an influential teacher and education researcher.  Even without knowing that he’s an important guy, you can sense his charm and intelligence like a warm glow.  He’s very thoughtful and [...]

Read the full article →

What every teacher should know about cognitive science

March 7, 2012

I’ve been invited a few times to speak to the GK12 fellows at CU-Boulder with an interactive presentation that I’ve developed that outlines some main findings from the learning sciences and cognitive psychology (though it’s by no means an exhaustive list), and brainstorms how one might use these ideas in the classroom. Below are the [...]

Read the full article →

What can we learn about learning from research in museums, media, and other informal environments? (#AAPTwm12)

March 7, 2012

A kid goes to a science museum, and plays around with a whirling vapor tornado.  The same kid sits in his science classes at school, and reads about weather and climate.  Do these two experiences have anything to do with each other?  Of course they do; but typically, we do “classroom science” in one way, [...]

Read the full article →

Recent talk by Carl Wieman: How people learn

March 7, 2012

My old boss Carl Wieman (now in the White House office of science and technology) recently gave a talk at the Optical Society for America on Transforming STEM Education:  A Scientific Approach to Teaching and Learning. It has a nice side-by-side of video and slides.  Dr. Wieman discusses his personal motivation for investigating how people [...]

Read the full article →

Seeking the warm spot: My nonlinear career path in science writing and education

February 29, 2012

I was recently invited to write an article for the Agora blog on women and science on my career path.  The resulting article is on their blog, but I am cross-posting it here for y’all: ——— I’ve spent a lot of my life worrying about what to do for a job.  I’ve had so many [...]

Read the full article →

Stephanie’s a “STEMinist”

February 26, 2012

I was recently featured in an interview on STEMinist about my career and philosophies.  Judging from the response on Twitter, a lot of people read that site (and liked my profile).  So, if you want a quick bite on my outlook and career path, take a look at that interview.

Read the full article →

Peer Instruction Network: A way to connect to #clicker users

February 26, 2012

Peer instruction is a technique of asking students to discuss a question with their neighbors, voting, and then holding a whole class discussion of the answers.  Visit the Physics Education Research User’s Guide here to see more about Peer Instruction. A lot of research has shown that users of peer instruction often don’t use it [...]

Read the full article →

What Do You Want Them To Learn Today? Materials from my workshop on learning goals at FTEP, 2/22/12

February 23, 2012

I just gave a workshop on learning goals to a great group of thoughtful faculty for our faculty teaching excellence program.   Here are the materials and slides from the workshop. —- Students don’t always learn what it is that we intend to teach them. In several science departments, faculty are addressing this gap by collaboratively [...]

Read the full article →

The effects of prison libraries

February 20, 2012

I’ve been a staunch advocate of education in prisons for quite a few years, though more through serendipity than a lifetime interest.  I was assigned to do an article on prisoner recidivism (ie., what helps keep them from going out of prison when they get out) for the now-defunct magazine Science & Spirit many years [...]

Read the full article →