COLLEGE OF EDUCATION & HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Texas A&M University

Plant Science Camp Teaches Students, Teachers

7/14/08

For one week in July, high school students from across Texas were paired with a national group of high school science teachers to learn about plant science and plant
science-related careers at Texas A&M University.

Carol Stuessy, associate professor of science education in the Department of Teaching, Learning and Culture, Claire Hemingway, project director of the Botanical Society of America, and Margaret Waterman and Ethel Stanley of BioQUEST Curriculum Consortium were awarded a grant from National Science Foundation to host the two-week workshop, July 7-18, 2008.

The program, titled Plant IT: Cases, Collaboration and Careers, recruited high school students from Texas, specifically Houston, to learn new things about plants from teachers across the nation.

"Plant biology is an area of high national need," BioQUEST Trainer Margaret Waterman said. "We developed cases to give teachers a chance to learn a new way to teach, taught students to work collaboratively because the world requires us to work together, and gave students opportunities to go on field trips to meet people in plant-related careers."

Teachers attended the full two-week workshop in order to learn innovative strategies and approaches to teaching. They also received new curriculum to take back to their schools to incorporate into their own classrooms, Waterman said.

"We want teachers to feel comfortable teaching other teachers these skills," she added.

Students arrived during the second week of the workshop to learn plant biology from the teachers and interact with professionals in the field. Charles "Dr. Biology" Kazilek from Arizona State University spent two days with the students developing podcasts from interviews they conducted with each other and experts they met on the field trips.

Students presented their podcasts on the final day of the workshop, and the winning podcast will be broadcast on Dr. Biology's show.

"We want students to take away an awareness of plant careers and to think of plants in a new and cool way," Waterman said, "and we want teachers to see plants and teaching about them in a new way as well."

To view the winning podcast from this year's workshop, visit Dr. Biology's Web site at http://askabiologist.asu.edu/expstuff/drbiocomic/index.html.

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