E to the poweR 5

A brief synopsis of the 5E model is given on a classmates blog, it shows the 5E model's main roots and purpose.

After receiving the 5E model, we were each then asked to use the model and apply it to the three papers (Lamarck, Darwin, Wallace) given as conceptual change readings in class. This is how I ended up using the assigned readings as a 5E model.

Explore

Present students with Darwin’s concept of evolution.

• Explain his observations
• Survival of the fittest

Present Lamarck’s concept of evolution.

• Explain his observations
• Things have a drive/purpose

Ask them to debate which point they feel fits best, when explaining the process of evolution.

Engage

Listen and be vigilant, taken note of what exactly their misconceptions are.

Explain

Armed with their misconceptions, explain the concept of “the shortest route” in this case survival of the fittest.

Elaborate

Find out what the students think and reason regarding: survival of the fittest vs. evolutionary purpose.

You can use Wallace's paper here as well, to help form a better understanding and support for Darwin's concept.

Evaluate

Hand out a questionnaire that will engage their thinking {The questionnaire used in class could be utilized}.

Technology at our disposal..... Digital Media!

Dr. Holtman (the course presenter) introduced us to her PhD student A. Daniels who utilises technology everyday as a teaching, sharing and an information gathering tool. He was very eager to share how he uses his blog in culmination with various programs to relay concepts and forming the information in a way that will allow maximum uptake by the engager of the content.

He used Audacity a free audio recording and manipulating program to record songs and lectures in convenient mp3 format and was ready with suggestions to how this free tool could give access to many possibilities. Such as home studio projects, sharing relevant segments of a lecture with fellow students etc. He really helped the part of the class not as interested in technology to understand that with using technology, you are open to many possibilities of expressing urself and learning. Werther it be through media, video sites like youtube, or using things like podcasts to listen to discussions and views of others.

With the current uptake of mobile phones, 99.9% of people I know are in the possession of a smartphone. This allows them instant access to the internet and by extension media streams, social networks and other parts of the digital universe. With their advanced handsets they can listen to and download, lectures, podcasts, office documents etc. on the fly. I, myself typed the majority of my reports and assignments on my trusty Nokia N82. And even studied my power points and pdf's for my EWS tests from my phones medium sized screen. Its all about using methods you are comfortable with and that works for you. Taylor making the learning experience, resulting in the learning experience and the content you are trying to uptake becoming more memorable.

Mr. Daniels gave a brief introduction "prompt" a kind of teleprompter software that enables you to use your webcam to make video casts with complete prompts running up the screen. Just like audacity the program gave great control, versatility and ease of use. Picasa was also touched on using it to make collages and story boards at a click of a button. With tech' becoming so vastly available and easy to use I can truly see the digital frontier dawning upon us even though the people with the fancy tech' don't ever really think about fully utilizing it. They keep to the most basic of basics which always gets me question "why they own it in the first place".

To touch on how powerful technology was in the past and how that same technology can still be relevant today. I decided to type this post and to post it using my N82. But one must remember technology is not only your gadget. Its the software your gadget uses or the bright new way you thought of using something someone else never thought of using or at least never thought of using it in that way it before. The crux is technology allows for the most flexible way of learning and engaging with the world around you..... currently at least...

Concepts and understanding are definitely linked! The are like toast and butter, it just works!

We had a discussion in BioEd, regarding case studies and how boring methods of teaching and learning could be souped up to uncover a new found interest and vigure in the subject under study.

We had to find a way to relay a concept that learners did not understand and engage with well and basically were clueless about even after we or the lectures taught this concept many times before.

We recieved guidance from R. Rait a Phd. seasoned case study writting student to Dr. Holtman. She gave helpfull advice to what to, and what not to do when writting case studies. Examples of which were to not ask students to be placed in scenarious of their own when using examples, to not ask them to be put into someones shoes, or to imagine a scenario ect. This is because it just stirs up confusion, and makes learners feel more lost.

Instead things like story telling and naratives could be used. Armed with this simple method to relay information and understanding we had to hunt for those confusing examples learners had to deal with before, and I decided to right a narrative if ever I had to explain mine again.

In a practical class for Life Science 141, learners executed a practical to help them understand that with the proccess of osmosis, theres a gain and loss of water through a differentially permeable membrane. On evaluating the reports written by students it was as clear as day that this concept was far from their understanding! Very far! I created my narrative to help learners understand where they went confused and what was the "right idea". Aiding them to put the two halves of the puzzle together so to say.

The class and the Riddle...

A class of students were given a very cryptic riddle before their lunch break and were left to their own devices, to solve it and present it after their break was finished. Ten minutes before the bell rings Kevin rushes to Tara!

Kevin: HAVE YOU FIGURED OUT THE RIDDLE YET?

Tara: I HAVE! ^_^

Kevin: LETS SEE?

*They both turn around holding a bag of water each, containing floating orange balls.

Tara: HOW-COME YOUR BAG IS ALMOST FILLED WITH WATER?

Kevin: 'CAUSE THATS WHAT THE RIDDLE ASKED FOR!

Tara: OH MY WORD! YOU HAVE TO HELP ME! PLEASE SHARE SOME OF YOUR WATER, SO THAT IT DOES NOT LOOK AS IF I HAVE MANY FLOATING BALLS IN SUCH A LITTLE WATER.

*Kevin pours over some water into Tara's bag filtering it with his fingers, allowing only water to pass by his fingers and none of the balls. He stopped when their water level was about equal.

Tara: OH MY WORD THIS IS ALMOST LIKE OSMOSIS!

This would be a small section before their practical reading and they would be asked to contrast and compare how this fits in with their practical, regarding they weight gain and loss of potato cores in different saline solutions.

Going against the grain... Lets Re-Program, not re-FORMAT!

Conceptual change... how do i start off this one? Well dealing with it in BioEd was kind of fast and painless, if had to sum it up. We basically just dealt with ways in dealing with misconceptions i.e. getting the correct concept behind whichever theory, or fact you need to teach and by extension understand for yourself of course. I'm sure you've come across the saying "the blind cant lead the blind" and "its always best to get your facts straight."

Well to get our "ducks in a row" since we are scientists, we used evolution and the survival of the fittest. We watched a excerpt of the Multi-drug resistant form of TB and how it has spread within a Russian Prison. Inmates already find it hard to take medication for the normal TB strain and because of this, strains of TB evolve resistance to the drugs that worked on them previously at a greater rate. *see video

We were then handed a questionnaire, that seem to have basic questions pertaining evolution. The first question was about 5 lions and the amount of lionesses they mated, the number of offspring they fathered, and the general circumstances the lived through up until their death. we then had to determine which lion was the fittest when taking the information given to us in consideration.

The second questioned pertained to blind cave fish and their loss of sight, and whether we agreed that it was due to isolation in the dark.

The third regarding bacterial resistance to antibiotics, and why antibiotic resistance could be a concern.

The last question pertained to the resistance of pests to pesticides, and why we think they have adapted resistance.

Although we all were very aware of Darwin's principle of survival of the fittest and we understood why these changes manifested in the examples given above, we all still leaned towards Lamarck's Explanation of purpose and drive. As in "the cave fish did not need eye sight, thus over generations they became blind as sight was wasted energy in a dark place."

Whereas Darwin's principle of survival of the fittest was the most logical, it just seemed to simple of an answer. Thus it was simply not given much of thought. But the principle of individuals having useful traits enabling them to outlast, out compete or out live their competitors suited much better because of the process of elimination. Elimination of the weakest and the survival of the strongest/best suited (fittest), allowed these stronger individuals with stronger or better traits to reproduce and pass on these traits to their offspring. In turn, allowing the next generation to be better suited. better able to survive and outlast those not that well suited.

This helped change our previous concept, and miss conception regarding evolution as a process of purpose to a process of natural selection.

Pe-dah-goge-i

Strange or as fancy as it might sound the word pedagogy (pe-dah-goge-i) does indeed exist, seriously I'm not making it up! It basically refers to how someone whose teaching goes about instructing or relaying the the theory or content that needs to be grasped by the receiver (student).

The father of this concept is widely accepted to be Lee Shulman, a Educational Psychologist that coined and introduced the phrase "Pedagogical Content Knowledge" (PCK) in his 1986 paper aptly titled "Those Who Understand: Knowledge Growth in Teaching." He encourages the professional development of teachers and their knowledge so that they are equipped to teach using broad knowledge of philosophies, teaching styles and the ability to approach lesson topics from different angles.

This is all done to make teaching lessons and topics as effective as possible allowing teachers to engage their learners in an efficient learning process. This is as teachers become aware of their students various learning preferences and needs, allowing lessons to be taught by the teacher in an appropriate manner. Thus its important for teachers to have this "wide scope" to pool from as lessons and teaching styles always need to accommodate different student. As students do not all share the same interests or learn and engage the same.

Thus the teaching process is continually evolving and the teacher needs to adapt their teaching style and methodology as is appropriate for that lesson and that group of students. This could be a great obstacle for the "not well salted" teachers as they can easily find themselves out of depth. You can imagine just how much work it can be, being a teacher not expanding your own knowledge evidently restricting the myriad of possibilities you could have used to relay, teach and evaluate your lessons to your students. Just because you can not think of new and exciting ways to present your lessons because you, yourself never exposed yourself to the possibility of new ideas of teaching to inspire your learners to learn. This may lead to the creation of a barrier between you and your learners, and you not being able to tap their full potential. Thus Shulman's haunting statement "He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches" haunts so many educational establishments.

How do clueless teachers get in the system?

Shulman records a previous era where teaching emphasis was based strongly on content knowledge. Teachers had to go about writing basic licensing exams, that they need to pass every couple of years in order to remain a teacher. But don't be fooled by the word "exam", the examined would simply need to show how their knowledge is defined when evaluated. He records an account of a thirteen year old that happened to take the exam, when accompanying her sister to take hers, passed it, with her basic "13 year old" knowledge.

As teachers are not subject to so called, "re-qualify" with exams, their is no need for them to keep in mind their prior knowledge nor expand on their current world knowledge. Thus many teacher get stuck in the rut of setting up one syllabubs, and repeating it year after year, class after class with little to no change. And so to theres little to no change in the general performance or pass rate of learners passing through the class.

Because of this, there is the common possibility of the one good teacher, being shoveled in with the "fossil" teachers resulting in the teaching profession all being painted with the same paint brush as the teachers that actually work are not recognized. And generation after generation of learners pass through multiple teachers never really getting and education, and never having the light bulb moments of inspiration.

Domino IMPACT!

Greetings READER! Linking back to The Lorax, revised in an earlier post. We had to go about findig real world examples we could use to show which ever class we are teaching something that is tangible and relatable. It should be something that could tie in with The Lorax when used as a teaching tool in order to relay and ensure that the concept at hand is brought across clearly and well defined.

My "Real World example" stems from volunteering at a Private Game Reserve outside of Graaff-Reinet situated in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. The reserve has plenty of Game and is set in a beautiful location, but as the reserves main attractions are its cheetahs, trophy hunting kudu, game drives and two of the big five (rhino and buffalo) they do not make as much money as surrounding reserves owning a greater number of the animals that comprise the big five.

A brief History and context.

Previously the reserve formed part of land that was mainly sheep farmed, resulting in many areas being overgrazed and nearly impossible to rehabilitate. These areas have been left to recover with natural vegetation before animals were reintroduced.

Although kudu were still naturally present in the areas, eland (a potentially destructive grazer) was re-introduced. The initial eland population boomed and are threatening to revert the land back to its barren state. As other grazers such as rooi bok, oryx, sprinbok, plains zebra ect. are too dependent on the vegetation, their carrying capacities may be reached sooner.

This reserve also participates in the cheetah project, the possible introduction of bigger cats like lion and leopards will adversely affect the projects efforts of conserving cheetah. As these cats are known to kill cheetah and rob them of their kills. Though this is controversial as the reserve needs to remain open to conserve these cats, the bigger cats will simply provide a better financial backing. This is as tourists are eager to pay to see the bigger, popular cats.Which may cause a problem as the cheetah is an endangered cat and natural hunting populations are dwindling fast.

Another support for introducing bigger cats are their use to control the big populations of eland. This my prevent recapture and selling costs synonymous wit keeping population sizes in check. Other arguments for controlling populations size which may yield some form of income may be that of culling and trophy hunting. Though one needs to bare in mind that the average "America" is not going to want to go home with a mounted female eland! Instead he wants to hunt the big strong bull, so the suggestion is not that grounded. Bigger cats may also tend to hunt smaller prey and not the suggested eland exclusively. Which would encroach on the cheetah even further.

There was possible discussion of elephant introduction.The reserve has well concentrated areas of Acaccia karoo (food source) but not dense enough to support a population of elephant greater than 10 in an already water stressed region. The introduction of other big game has been suggested to attracted a greater number of visitors to the reserve. As these are the kinds of animals tourists, especially foreign tourists come to "Africa" to see. But with carrying capacities, food webs and other forms of species interactions there is no one approach that can be approached.

Thus if planning and the correct information are not weighed equally. The pros will outweigh the cons and vice versa depending on the approach and the desired outcome. Thus biodiversity present before can easily become absent, and no one truly knows the effect that removing a single species may have, as there are so many unseen's.

Hopefully the many possibilities a single action can put into motion can be understood by the learners. And that the how and the scale something affects the other can never truly be predicted.

Biology Education and Teaching Methods

I have started a new module at the University of the Western Cape, that aspires to deal with the ever surfacing problem of teaching and relaying concepts to students. Many teaching methods have been devised over the past, but as its known some seem to work and some don't.

Step in "pedagogical" teaching methods, which tries

to relay these concepts that need to be learnt by using "Real World" examples, that the learner can identify and grasp. One of these given to us in class to read was Dr. Seuss's "The Lorax" which even though it was published in 1970's is pretty fitting in todays real world.

We were tasked to identify the main findings, characters and events unfolding in the for-mentioned book, and this is what i came up with!

Main Concept

The main crux of the story is environmental impact. The book nicely stated the two main kinds of people that are present among us i.e. the Nature Lover and the Money Lover.

It addresses some of the effects of environmental impact; such as the relocation of native inhabitants, deforestation, habitat loss etc. It shows how blind greed can escalate and get out of hand, as the over-harvesting of the truffula trees (key species) had a domino effect on all the other species both directly or indirectly dependent on these trees.

Characters in the Book

• A boy
• The Once-ler
• Lorax
• Various creatures that inhabit the forest

Events

• Boy asks/pays Once-ler to tell the mysterious story of the Lorax.
• Discovery of a resource (truffula trees) by the Once-ler (main story starts)
• Escalation in the exploitation of the resource. Lorax tries to convince the Once-ler to curb its usage of the resource.
• Over-exploitation leads to habitat and resource loss.
• No one can depend on the resource anymore.
• Once-ler tries to right his wrongs by placing the fate of the last truffula tree (a seed) in the hands of the Small boy. Hoping the the boy learned from his previous mistakes.

Well that was it in a nutshell, the book should be very engaging to younger audiences and like all Dr. Seuss books, it reads with a bit of rhythm and rhyme. If you cant get your hands on the book, go ahead and watch the video below. ^_^ Enjoy!