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Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 1
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09/25/05 07:59 PM |
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To be a little clearer:
I would like to know about your experiences with resources and prac structure. For example, do students have computer access before and during prac classes, do they commonly share their results with other students, are they encouraged to discuss each others results, do they need to use excel to present their results (LAMS could present them with a way to share their excel spreadsheets/graphs), do teachers have time to access student work before they come to class and so on.
Thanks
Posted by Bronwen Dalziel
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3:
Re: Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 2
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09/26/05 02:14 PM |
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We run day-long labs in Years 1 and 2 that typically have a mix of wet and dry elements. I can only speak for the class that I run.
Q. Do students have computer access before and during prac classes?
A. Yes (their own and university clusters) and Yes (but less so, a small cluster and a few wifi laptops).
Q. Do they commonly share their results with other students?
A. Yes -- it is a fairly common strategy to get students to collate their data, sometimes replicates for statistical purposes, sometimes protocol variants as part of a factorial design.
Q. Are they encouraged to discuss each others results?
A. I'm sure it would be good if they did but I think this is less common, at least with large classes. It's something I'm moving towards.
Q. Do teachers have time to access student work before they come to class?
A. I wish I did but I don't! Again, class size and teaching load are issues.
Posted by Peter Miller
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5:
Re: Re: Re: Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 4
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09/26/05 06:56 PM |
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Thanks for your feedback Peter.
How big is a prac group normally? We would run a prac of around 120 students, but there would be around 20-25 students per demonstrator. Pracs would typically have a 1 hour tutorial followed by 4 hours experimental work. There are 2 banks of about 15 computers for processing results. I know this set up was considered expensive by the department and the number of pracs has recently been halved.
Transferring the cost of the tutorials (at around $70/25 demonstrators/week) over to a LAMS format would already be saving a lot of money. Not that the demonstraotrs (PhD students) would be too thrilled.
I will try to work up a real prac soon to show how I think LAMS can be used.
I will also talk to Robyn about setting up a survey for this topic.
Thanks again.
Posted by Bronwen Dalziel
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6:
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 5
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09/27/05 05:25 PM |
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Q. How big is a prac group normally? We would run a prac of around 120 students, but there would be around 20-25 students per demonstrator.
A. Similar size: 110-160, 3 staff + 5 demonstrators, runs twice in 6-week slots, full-day each Thursday! I'm not claiming this is typical.
Not sure that I want to replace wet labs entirely for obvious reasons. Using LAMS to get students involved in experimental design is one objective I have but didn't realise this year.
Generically we also use computers on the course for data collation, image processing and simulation (slime mould signalling with the Laub-Loomis model). The latter would be a good target too.
Posted by Peter Miller
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Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 1
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10/17/05 10:14 PM |
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I'd be interested to hear from scientists in the LAMS community re - how you use discussion in science with your students?
Sometimes when we are demonstrating or talking about LAMS, staff from the sciences say that they can see the usefulness of LAMS for Humanities and the Social Sciences - but acknowledge that they do things differently in the sciences. This debate usally centres around the value or use of discussions.
When I think about how students learn, I know that discussing,describing, explaining, sharing, defending a point of view, listening to the way others descibe or approach the topic, analysing and evaluating ideas helps the learning process.LAMS is really good for facilitating this process. I'm sure this dialogue, debate etc - all happens in science. So is the issue about *where* it happens in the curriculum? Should discussion happen outside of class? in the class? what sort of discussion? what are the best prompts for scientific discussion? Is question and answer - socratic method - appropriate?
Robyn
Posted by Robyn Philip
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8:
Re: Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 7
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10/21/05 02:27 PM |
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Today I tried using an analogy to stimulate discussion on the evolution of proteins. The analogy was one of those word puzzles where one word changes into another by altering one letter at a time, each intermediate also being a word. I then asked the students how similar this might be to the evolution of the amino acid sequence of proteins. I suspect they had more fun trying to dream up "inappropriate" intermediates but, not pressed too far, I think analogies can sometimes be useful starting points for discussion.
Of course, scientific papers also serve as a good starting point, especially if the students are challenged with the unexpected. The recent discovery of "giant" viruses such as Mimivirus formed the basis for a discussion of whether we needed to reexamine our definition of such entities.
I think the tricky aspect is finding a suitable subject. I think it fair to say that I probably under-utilise discussion (I have strong instructivist genes) but LAMS has encouraged me to be a little more adventurous.
Posted by Peter Miller
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Re: Using LAMS in Science
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In response to 8
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03/15/06 04:02 PM |
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For the scientists out there - would using LAMS for the process of hypothesising be useful?
Is this something that students do well or badly?
What skills in hypothesising do first year students lack?
What about honours students - are there areas in the development of generic skills where LAMS could be used to good effect?
Robyn
Posted by Robyn Philip
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