(Click to enlarge) The On the Cutting Edge project helps geoscience faculty stay up-to-date with both geoscience research and teaching methods. The workshop series and website combine to provide professional development opportunities, resources, and opportunities for faculty to interact on-line and in person with colleagues around the world who are focused on improving their teaching. (Photo Credit Scott Glenn)
The Ocean Observatory Initiative (OOI) Education and Public Engagement (EPE) implementing organization lead several sessions to connect with potential OOI users at the “Teaching Oceanography” workshop held in San Francisco, CA last month.
The “Teaching Oceanography” workshop was designed specifically for instructors of undergraduate Introductory Oceanography. The workshop was offered through the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, funded by NSF, and in partnership with InTeGrate – Interdisciplinary Teaching of Geoscience for a Sustainable Future.
At the workshop, Scott Glenn, Rutgers Principal Investigator for the EPE Implementing Organization and Janice McDonnell (marine educator and project staff for EPE) were able to interact with potential users of the OOI through workshops, presentations, and working groups.
The OOI EPE team, led by Rutgers, is building a suite of software interfaces and web-based tools that will allow educators to bring ocean data and information into their learning environments. Rutgers, in leading the development of educational capabilities for the OOI, will leverage the OOI cyberinfrastructure capabilities by constructing a series of software and web-based social networking tools to engage a wide range of users.
Glenn and McDonnell hosted a 2-hour workshop session about OOI Lab builders, specifically the ocean acidification and hurricane units. During this session, 20 community college professors were able to explore the Lesson Lab Builder (LLB), one of the many undergraduate focused learning tools being developed by the OOI EPE. With this particular tool, undergraduate professors can design laboratories and problem-based activities using archived and real time OOI data. Two prototype lessons – ocean acidification and hurricanes – were demonstrated using the LLB software.
(Click to enlarge) Workshop participants divided into brainstorming groups focused on developing real time data lesson applications using EPE tools in the undergraduate classroom. (Photo Credit Scott Glenn)
In a special session entitled “Resources for Our Next Steps,” Glenn presented an overview of EPE tools to all workshop participants. Click here to download his presentation “The Ocean is Our Classroom.”
Glenn and McDonnell were also able to engage the entire workshop in a discussion through a working group. The 2-hour development/brainstorming session focused on how community college professors can participate in developing lessons for the LLB.
“We learned so much from having the opportunity to work with these talented community college professors,” says McDonnell. “We look forward to a long and productive working relationship with the InTeGrate program”.
The OOI, a project funded by the National Science Foundation, is managed and coordinated by the OOI Program Office at the Consortium for Ocean Leadership, in Washington, D.C., and is responsible for construction and initial operations of the OOI network. Five major Implementing Organizations are responsible for construction and development of the overall program. Of these, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is providing the education and public engagement software infrastructure.
Click here for more information on the OOI Education and Public Engagement. Please continue to visit the OOI Website for updates and other program news and events.
(Click to enlarge) Glenn and McDonnell participate in the workshop Share Fair, demonstrating the EPE data visualization tools. (Photo Credit Scott Glenn)