Science Case Network

Software Framework for 21st Century STEM Practice and Education

Web Editor — Sun, 23 Sep 2012 17:11:59 +0000

How can cases build on this significant NSF re-envisioning of software as community for a globally connected and data-enabled world?

A VISION AND STRATEGY FOR SOFTWARE FOR SCIENCE, ENGINEERING, AND EDUCATION CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FRAMEWORK FOR THE 21st CENTURY

“… ensuring comprehensive, usable, and secure software and services to further new scientific discovery and innovative education approaches by its researchers working in a globally connected and data-enabled world; fostering sustainable communities of software users, researchers, developers, industrial scientists and engineers, educators, and students that span disciplines, professions, and regions/countries; and promoting new approaches to learning and workforce development in software, and supporting investigations in the use of software for novel learning mechanisms.”

Read more at: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2012/nsf12113/nsf12113.pdf?WT.mc_id=USNSF_80

Is English Your Second Language?

Web Editor — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 04:33:41 +0000

We would like to hear your suggestions about how to improve the accessibility of our Science Case Network.

Consider adding a translation browser button to your browser’s toolbar for the SCN web site. Go to http://translate.google.com/translate buttons to convert from English to another language.

A sample of the August 2012 Monthly Spotlight on Cases is translated to Spanish below.

If you speak Spanish, please comment below on this translation’s accuracy? Thanks.

Si usted habla español, por favor dejar un comentario más abajo en la exactitud de esta traducción? Gracias.

Science Inquiry-Based Instruction Prize for Case It!

Web Editor — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 06:46:13 +0000

SCN offers a big shout-out to Steering Committee members, Mark Bergland, Karen Klyczek, and Bjorn Wolter for their work with fellow collaborators Chi-Cheng Lin, Rafael Tosado-Acevedo, Arlin Toro, Dinitra White, Mary Lundeberg on the Case It! Project recently awarded an AAAS Science Prize for Inquiry-based Instruction (IBI).

An essay describing this project can be found in the July 27, 2012 issue of Science (“Engaging Students in Molecular Biology via Case-Based Learning“).

From the Science web site: “The Science Prize for Inquiry-Based Instruction (IBI) has been established to encourage innovation and excellence in education by recognizing outstanding, inquiry-based science and design-based engineering education modules. This type of education is a form of active learning wherein the instructor provides a question, or a challenge, and a general set of procedures that can be used to answer it. The students then produce an explanation or answer that is based on the evidence that they collect from appropriate resource materials or experimental processes that are, at least in part, of the students own proposal.”

More information is available in the press release from AAAS, and the editorial by Bruce Alberts, Editor in Chief of Science.

Using Investigative Cases to Explore the Plasmodium Problem Space

Sam Donovan — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:31:14 +0000

The case Blind Spot by Sam Donovan at the University of Pittsburgh sets the stage for students who will pursue scientific understanding by working collaboratively on answering a question of their own choice using the Plasmodium Problem Space.

Blind Spot by Sam Donovan, University of Pittsburgh

Stacey had thought the opportunity to study wild chimpanzees in Cameroon would be a perfect summer research project. Despite having to work through a maze of official paperwork, satisfy her parents’ anxieties about traveling alone, and tolerate the side effect of Mefloquine, she remained enthusiastic.

After sitting in the blind for two hours with three more to go, Stacey realized it wasn’t exactly a tropical vacation. It was a pretty small space, but she had everything she needed – her spotting scope, research notebook, camera, compass, map, GPS, satellite phone, water bottle, and snacks. She stifled an impulse to stretch again.

This was her first day at the new site observing Pt elioti. From what she could see, their behavior pattern of sleeping and stretching was similar to what she had seen in Pt troglodytes during her orientation at the initial site. The young chimps were sometimes active during these middle of the day observations, but for the adults, getting up to poop was about the most they moved around.

About a dozen mosquitoes took turns flying around her head and then trying to bite any exposed area. Clearing all of them out of the blind proved impossible, especially since the long drive over the mountains yesterday had left her a bit stiff. She was protected by her meds, so swatting them when they came too close seemed sufficient.

A movement in the trees caught her eye. She quickly zoomed her spotting scope in on the action. Abe, a teenage male, was repositioning himself. She watched him for a while and then chuckled. Pestered by mosquitoes, Abe regularly shooed them away from his ears and face.

She stretched and shifted her position trying to get comfortable on the metal stool. The similarities between her situation and the chimp’s was not lost on her. “I wonder if he should be taking Mefloquine too?” Stacey asked no one in particular.

The case can be used to encourage students to share what they know and need to know as well as to develop their own questions about humans, chimpanzees, mosquitoes, and malaria. Students will then gain access to the Plasmodium Problem Space that provides resources (such as data sets, tools, and links to diverse materials for studying malaria biology) to explore these questions.

You can see collaborative work by a group of UT-Knoxville graduate students using the tools and resources featured in the problem space in Crisis at the Okapi Wildlife Reserve (http://bioquest.org/peer2012/2012/08/15/crisis-at-the-okapi-wildlife-reserve/)

Investigative case-based learning incorporates problem posing, problem solving, and peer persuasion (Peterson and Jungck, 1988, Waterman and Stanley, 2004) by providing students with the opportunity to pursue a more realistic set of science engagements.

-problem posing, teaching them to ask questions and develop research strategies (elicits prior knowledge and misconceptions)
-problem solving – having a data/resource rich context for doing the work
-peer review & persuasion – placing an emphasis on describing the evidence base for claims.

Students investigate scientific questions that they find relevant as well as:

-locate and manage information;
-connect their research question to broad/applied contexts;
-develop reasonable answers to their questions;
-communicate their scientific reasoning to their peers;
-provide support for their conclusions, and;
-work on decision making abilities.

Students will also consider what kinds of scientific products result from this problem solving. They may be asked to produce a research proposal, pamphlet, report, or graph.

Student responses to Blind Spot follow:

1. What is the case about?

Field work, chimpanzees, malaria, nature of science, primate biology, mosquitoes, primate behavior, preventative malarial treatments such as Mefloquine, endangered species, biogeography, world health, etc.

2. Know/ Need to Know Chart

3. What question will your group investigate?

Examples: Where does malaria come from? Can chimpanzees get malaria? How can scientists learn how to better prevent malaria in humans by studying other primates?

4. List specific resources you can use to answer your questions:

-CDC Malaria Page http://www.cdc.gov/MALARIA/

-Encyclopedia of Life Chimpanzee page http://eol.org/pages/326449/overview

-Malaria Maps Project http://www.map.ox.ac.uk/

5. Access the Plasmodium Problem Space

Plasmodium Problem Space

A problem space is a collection of resources that can be used to support student research. For example, a group of students could:

-Look at the Plasmodium sequence data summary and site map from the Liu et al. (2011) study and generate a list of observations and questions.

-Select the Plasmodium sequences from 2 collection sites and run a multiple sequence alignment to get a sense of how similar/different the parasites are from each other. Creating a distance tree will help to determine if the sites have independent or mixed Plasmodium populations.

BioQUEST Workshop Generates Stacey Cases

Web Editor — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 00:14:35 +0000

Goucher College hosted the BioQUEST 2012 Summer Workshop in Baltimore, MD.

The 2012 Summer Workshop, 26th in the series, was held at Goucher College’s striking Athenaeum Building overlooking a blooming prairie in Baltimore and set its own special mark in the annals of BioQUEST. The theme this year was Making a Difference with Data. As far as I’m concerned, we could have stopped at Making a Difference.

Workshops take on a life of their own as the participants, presenters, and staff interact and extend the original agenda. BioQUEST workshops are almost guaranteed to morph due to the dangerous mix of problem posing, problem solving and peer review. Open spaces, collegiality, collaboration, and shared work time aided the transformation. The sum of the individuals at the 2012 workshop proved far greater than their total.

We knew we were onto something special as groups formed around their projects. Participants conspired to improve the speed dating process to find potential partners by developing an Excel file of fields such as What do we know? Who knows this? What do we need to know? Who wants to know this? Who knows this? and populating the fields with participant information. The result: Who ya gonna call? Participant Finder

This was also the year of the Stacey Cases. Inspired by a presentation from Science Case Network RCN-UBE Project PI, Margaret Waterman, many groups decided to use cases to introduce their projects around data literacy, data mash-ups, data sets, data analysis and visualization, and big data. Oh, they also included a character named Stacey in each case. (Normally you would have to be there to get the joke, but fortunately I can let you know why Stacey became an instant favorite name for characters in a case..)

The first of several Stacey cases introduces bird data.

The real Stacey is Stacey Kiser, the new Vice President of BioQUEST from Lane Community College in Eugene, Oregon. Retiring Director of BioQUEST, Ethel Stanley, was known to call both Kristin Jenkins, new Executive Director of BioQUEST, and local host, Gretchen Koch-Noble, by the name of Stacey during times of stress… In fact, even Kristin started calling folks Stacey as well. As a result, Stacey, Kristin, and Gretchen bore name tags with all three of their names. As a memory aid to others, the two incorrect names were crossed out.

To see these fab Stacey Cases in the Final Projects as well as the use of data, go to the BQ Blog Posts. We really do work in our workshops!

Note: We are sharing a Stacey Case below that was written at the BQ workshop by our very own SCN members.

A spontaneous case authored by E.Stanley (aka Stacey), M.Waterman, K.Klyczek, and M.Bergland during their SCN meeting after lunch.

Exploring data collection via cell phone on a string? (Courtesy Rudi and Stacey, BQ 2012)

Out of Thin Air…

A few moments after the meeting began, Stacey was surprised as a spool of string suddenly appeared outside the window from the upper floor of the building and fell rapidly unwinding string behind it. Nudging Margaret, she directed her attention to the dangling string.

“Look,” Margaret exclaimed as the string was pulled taught from below and angled away from the building.

Mark and Karen turned around to look as a cell phone hanging by its strap began sliding down the string. They watched silently as the unseen team jiggled the string to keep the phone moving downwards.

Mark asked, “What do you think is going on?”

“Do you think they are students doing a lab?” Karen suggested.

“Data collection?” Stacey asked.

“Maybe they are taking pictures for an art project?” Mark offered.

“How about some ap for rate of descent?” Karen added.

“Wow, wouldn’t this make a great case for teaching instructional design?” Margaret asked.

The group looked at each other and smiled in agreement.

Reinventing the Wheel: Adopt and Adapt Cases

Pat Marsteller — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 16:36:12 +0000

By Pat Marsteller

At my workshops, the first participant questions usually include: “How do I find the time to write cases?” and “How long does it take to design problem spaces that really engage the learners?”

A surprising number of cases are now accessible online. The topics, audience level, case style, teaching notes, sample activities and assessments can also be found. (Note: You can go to Cases&PBL in the menu above and select Finding Cases in the sub menu or just click here.)

You can adopt an existing case, adapt it to your specific learning objectives, add authentic assessments and resources appropriate for your learners, and the case is ready to go. Sometimes reinventing the wheel works best.

Adapting Cases to Your Objectives for Student Learning

Student learning is often enhanced when courses, assignments and cases have clear goals and objectives. Sometimes you will find a case or problem that seems to fit your concept, but it is written for a different level course with objectives or resources that don’t exactly fit. You may need to provide a more appropriate background or possibly restructure the case to engage your own students with the problem. Choosing key questions and providing initial resources will also help set the stage.

We will look at the questions and resources for my two-part case adapted from A Case Study Involving Influenza and the Influenza Vaccine by John S. Bennett that can be found in the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (NCCSTS) Case Collection.

Preventing the Flu

Scene 1: Conversation between college students

George:

Hey Mary, how’s it going? With finals coming up, my life is crazy! I sure hope I don’t get the flu again like I did last year… My Gen Chem grade took a nose dive!

Mary:

So did you get your flu shot? I did.

George:

No way I’m wasting $30 bucks on a flu shot. I got one last year and I still got sick. So sick I missed the Falcon’s game and had to watch it on TV at Jim’s party. Jim got one too and he got the stomach flu. Besides aren’t you worried about side effects from the flu shot?

Mary:

Shoot, no! Besides if you get the shot you won’t spread the flu to others. I heard on TV that a certain percentage of the population have to be protected or we could have an epidemic, like the one in 1918. I think over 20 million people died!

George:

Are you sure that was flu? I’m gonna ask my Bio prof.

Scene 2: Later that day…

George:

Wow! My bio prof showed me a neat program to look at the effects of people getting vaccinated. Let me show you….It’s called the SIR module.

http://www.bioquest.org/esteem/esteem_result.php

Questions

After our discussion of the first part of the case, Preventing the Flu, the following questions were given to each group of students.

1. What are the main symptoms of influenza?

2. Would you expect a flu shot to protect against the “stomach flu”? Why or why not?

3. Identify some of the various causative agents of “stomach flu” and compare them to the influenza virus.

4. Explain how a vaccine provides immunity against infection. Are there any side effects to the influenza vaccine? Should George or Mary worry about developing autism?

5. George described the flu that he suffered last year despite his flu shot. How can you explain this. (Hint: Why don’t flu shots protect you for multiple years?)

Learning Issue Reports

Each person is responsible for one of the learning issues identified. The idea is to gather as much information as possible and summarize the relevant material for the group. For each learning issue, you should use at least one primary reference, and at least four websites. It’s very important that each group member do his/her best work researching the issues so that the whole group will master all the learning issues it has identified.

For your issue, please prepare a one-two page report including:

A description of the issue. What are you trying to learn?
A thorough list of the resources you used while researching your issue ( > 5 resources). Please use full citations. Please include a critical explanation of why you found the resource to be trustworthy or not. For example, list several websites you tried in order to understand the issue. For each website, explain why you found it helpful or useless. Would you recommend the website to other students for help in understanding the issue? Is the author of the information you are reading qualified to make such statements? Remember to give a critical explanation for each resource you use during your research of the issue.
A concluding paragraph that will fully explain the issue to others who didn’t do the research but who want to learn about the issue. It is your job to teach the others in your group what you learned by doing your research. If you find conflicting evidence, describe how you determined which resource to trust.

Two Part Cases

Scene 2 was added to the original case idea because I wanted the case to provoke them to consider more quantitative analyses. Their homework included using the SIR model to examine the impact of flu vaccines.

Resources

The following resources were also made available for the undergraduate students in my course:

http://virus.stanford.edu/uda/ Information about commonly acquired infectious illnesses

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compartmental_models_in_epidemiology Models for the spread of disease.

http://www3.niaid.nih.gov/healthscience/healthtopics/Flu/default.htm This site provides a good analysis of the symptoms, causes, treatments and preventatives for infectious illnesses that are commonly acquired.

http://www.niaid.nih.gov/Publications/cold/sick.pdf Is It a Cold or the Flu?

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/revb/gastro/norovirus-qa.htm Norovirus Q&A

http://www.cdc.gov/flu What You Should Know About the Flu This is an excellent site with too many links to describe for this single case study. It can provide students with a tremendous source of introductory information and links to peer reviewed publications.

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/gen-info/flu-viruses.htm Influenza Viruses: Drift and Shift

http://1918.pandemicflu.gov/ Flu in 1918

Smith, N.M., J.S. Bresee, D.K. Shay, T.M. Uyeki, N.J. Cox, and R.A. Strikas. 2006. Prevention and control of influenza: Recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). MMWR Recommendations and Reports July 28, 2006 / 55(RR10):1–42. Vaccine Recommendations

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5510a1.htm Flu Activity—Reports and Surveillance Methods in the United States

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/fluactivity.htm This site is updated weekly and will help instructors and students alike find the most up to date studies regarding influenza surveillance.

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/ Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) A free, online resource linked to the CDC website. Go to the MMWR site, and use the local search engine to find “influenza.”

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/antiviral.htm Questions and Answers—Influenza (Flu) Antiviral Drugs This site is designed for clinical determination of proper dosage of antiviral drugs in the treatment of influenza, but it is particularly helpful in describing the fundamental properties of the antiviral drugs Tamiflu® (oseltamivir) and Relenza® (zanamivir).

How might use the flu case?

Suppose you want students to examine historical data and consider how vaccine scientists might decide to develop the current vaccine. You could have them visit the following resources:

http://www.popsci.com/content/numbers-flu-season-visualized

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/fluactivitysurv.htm

In a more advanced course, you might have them compare sequences for different strains using the influenza research database.

http://www.fludb.org/brc/fluStrainDetails.do?strainName=A/California/04/2009%28H1N1%29&decorator=influenza

The choice is yours. Any case can be adapted to different levels of investigation and autonomy.

Adapting Cases for Your Students

To make cases engaging for your students, you have to begin with what your students find interesting. Are they primarily interested in one facet of biology or mathematics or computing? What do they like to read? What kinds of movies do they watch? What music do they listen to? What sports do they watch or play? What clubs do they belong to? Who do they admire? Will they be more interested if your case is based on a recent event that happened locally or does it require a novel setting? Are they ready to use primary literature or should your resources focus on general interest publications or news articles?

Undergraduates may respond to characters that talk like they do. Embedded information on careers in science is often intriguing to them. Many students respond to dilemmas and suspense, although they can be captured by a more didactic style or a news story. It helps to have local interest for some students. For example,an invasive species case set in the northeastern part of the U.S. can be changed to fit our Atlanta area by choosing invasive species that have created havoc here.

To find some invasive species in your own neck of the woods, see: http://www.fs.fed.us/invasivespecies/contactus.shtml.

How do you find out what the students interests are? You might want to use a student interest survey like this one. There are a variety of interest inventories on the web including ones you can purchase. However, an open class discussion on interests may give you insight on how to engage their interests and connect them to the sciences and related disciplines.

Your students have different backgrounds, experiences and abilities. In order to meet the learning needs of all your students, you may need to differentiate your instruction by providing entry points for different kinds of learners, accommodating differently abled students, or providing supplemental instruction for those with weaker backgrounds. You may find that redesigning cases to include people from different cultures and perspectives will help.

To help you think about student differences, you may wish to explore the following resources:

Sherrill L. Sellers, Jean Roberts, Levi Giovanetto, Katherine Friedrich, and Caroline Hammargre. (2007, 2nd ed.). Reaching All StudentsA Resource for Teaching in Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics. (Accessed Mar 2012). http://www.cirtl.net/ReachingAllStudents
Sherrill L. Sellers, Katherine A. Friedrich, Nilhan Gunasekera, Tabassum Saleem, Judith N. Bursty. (2006, 2nd ed.). Case Studies in Inclusive Teaching in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. (Accessed Mar 2012). http://cirtl.wceruw.org/diversityresources/resources/case-book/downloads/Case%20Studies%20in%20Inclusive%20Teaching.pdf
Vanderbilt University. (2012). Diversity & Inclusive Teaching. (Accessed Mar 2012). http://www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/resources/teaching_resources/interactions/diversity.htm

BioQUEST News & SCN

Web Editor — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 02:02:22 +0000

Note the new link to the Science Case Network in the BQ News on the BioQUEST home page.

NCCSTS Features SCN

Web Editor — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 01:52:24 +0000

The National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science has featured the SCN site this month.

Bringing the Power of Stories to Education

Ethel Stanley — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 18:25:04 +0000

Bringing the Power of Stories to Education by Jill Hopke cites both our Science Case Network RCN-UBE and the BioQUEST Investigative Cases Project in her reflections of the March 16, 2012 UW-Madison workshop, How Stories Teach, that focused on integrating cases studies into science education to internationalize curriculum.

Participants explore a case on the commercial apple industry and water footprints at the BioEd Workshop held at the University of Western Cape in Cape Town, ZA in 2009.

The SCN website hosted resources for the workshop’s Keynote Address that emphasized that science education is global education.

Note from Web Editor: If you have a workshop presentation coming up, consider linking your resources on our site for a broader community outreach. You could submit a post or work with me to set up your own page.

You might also wish to create a Group for your participants to join. They can post comments and come back to link up with members of your group after the workshop. Another advantage of bringing a group to SCN is they can use our community to explore cases, find like-minded members, and learn about upcoming events.

Why Log In?

Web Editor — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 23:30:44 +0000

Make your voice heard…

Join the community by logging in!

ScienceCaseNet is a place to network.

When you log in, you can:

- upload a new avatar (who are you behind that icon?)

- join a group

- raise a new issue specific to your own case teaching

- post your favorite resources

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- reply to someone’s question or discussion

- make suggestions on the website to improve its use

- introduce your favorite case and pbl projects

- add to our calendar

If you have other items to add to this list, please reply below. (Note: If you are logged in, you don’t have to enter your name and email address to reply. Yet another advantage of logging in!)

Thanks! :)