Discovery Research K-12 Project Award 0733280

1. Planting Science Research in EducationClaire Hemingway, Botanical Society of America - PI William Dahl, Botanical Society of America - CoPI Carol Stuessy, Texas A&M University - CoPI Discovery Research K-12 Project Award 0733280 Aims, Activities, Questions Online Community Curricular Materials Benefits • Suite of modules from introductory to advanced, structured around hands-on plant inquiry • Support for research, collaboration, and communication across an inquiry cycle • Collaborative development process involving teacher-scientist-education specialist teams • Student attitudes about enjoying studying plants and finding plant biology an easy subject increased significantly • PlantingScience leverages cyberlearning to make science experts broadly accessible to secondary school classrooms. Scientists volunteer as online mentors to coach students through the inquiry process. The aim is to improve understanding of how science works while fostering awareness of plants. • Activities: • Create opportunities for scientists, students and teachers to interact via advancing technologies. • Scaffold secondary school students’ experiences conducting inquiries with online mentoring. • Develop and test inquiry teaching and learning resources that integrate plant content and process. • Provide teachers with summer workshops to enhance their facility with science inquiry and plant biology. • Generate new understandings about collaborative learning environment. • Research Questions: • What factors create effective support for online mentored inquiries? • What are student learning? At what points in the inquiry do students “bog down”? What does orchestration of the classroom environment look like? • How do plant scientists engage in scientific discourse with students and teachers? • How do students engage with scientists and peers? • Students tending plants experience biophilia • Students like experiencing the science enterprise as a community endeavor with mentor • Teachers find online mentored inquiry program positive for their students • Teachers network with peers, scientists, and education researchers for extended support in the learning community • Scientists find value and enjoyment from online collaboration with students and teachers • Scientists and teachers alike report impacts on their perceived roles • From 2005 to 2010, >7,500 students and their teachers in 31 states collaborated with mentors • Team projects in Research Gallery remain a digital legacy of student work, serve as research archive • High schools account for ~60% of the classes Summer Institutes • Middle school students tend to engage more in discourse with their scientist mentors • All students tend to struggle with asking biologically relevant questions, presenting and making sense of their data Collaborations • Residential workshop at Texas A&M to deepen biology content, enhance inquiry skills, use online platform, tailor inquiry for class • 5 day inquiry immersion with scientists • Research and education communities • 14 scientific societies and organizations (and growing) contributing >500 scientist mentors • BSA, ASPB sponsor graduate students making extra mentoring commitment • Dr. Stuessy and TAMU graduate student team support workshop, conduct research and internal evaluation • Dr. Jane Larson and BSCS conduct external evaluation • Patterns of discourse and engagement, posting statistics • Coding via rubric of dialog and artifacts • Preliminary results inform teacher and mentor preparation, design, community facilitation 2008: germination, photosynthesis, respiration 2009: genetics, pollination 2010: reproduction, cell structure 2011: Arabidopsis genetics, physiology planned • Global connectivity allows participation world-wide (mentors from Canada, U.K., Turkey, India… ) • Model can be broadly applied from middle school to college, after-school clubs, international groups http://www.plantingscience.org