Building students engagement

Publikacja przedstawia sposób budowania zaangażowania studentów w rozwój własny – od zdobywania informacji i wiedzy, poprzez jej analizowanie pod kątem przydatności do rozwiązania problemu aż do stosowania zdobytych umiejętności w pracy z innymi. Realizacja podanych celów stała się możliwa dzięki zastosowaniu połączenia kilku metod dydaktycznych oraz narzędzi wykorzystywanych w pracy metodą Webquestów. Przeanalizujemy przedstawiony proces budowania zaangażowania analizując przykładowe efekty pracy studentów kierunku Transport Wydziału Mechanicznego Politechniki Łódzkiej, a szczególnie sposoby wykorzystania zdobytej wiedzy w pracy z innymi.The publication presents a way of building students engagement through preparing projects and explaining the gained knowledge. Reaching the target was possible due to combining PBL and WebQuest. The examples of the projects show that the students not only got to know many new facts/theorems, but they also worked on quite well known ideas. While analysing different problems, they found many aspects that could be considered in their analyses. The presentations prepared by the students during their work on the projects were not described in detail. An extra value that their engagement brought was highlighted. A list of workshops based on the problems prepared by the students was later compiled. The students of the Mechanical Faculty of Lodz University of Technology showed that they could not only explain normal situations by using an advanced theory, but they could also translate scientific laws to young people

Quizy mobilne w matematyce

The paper presents new possibilities for learning offered by the use of mobile quizzes in mathematics. We present quizzes created with the MobileQuiz2 application of the University of Mannheim. The main difficulty to overcome was writing mathematical texts and implementing interactive math applets. The applets illustrate particular issues and enable the students to interact with the course content more deeply than simple listening. The combination of interactive math applets and mobile quiz can then be used during the lectures as well as learning quizzes with hints. These are invaluable before a test or exam. The mobile quizzes can directly be enriched with equations, interactive formulas or drawings. When used in large variety, they are entertainment and a spectacular form of repetition of the material. In addition, the lecturer has the side benefit of an immediate feedback, which shows him the degree of the students’ understanding of the topic.Artykuł przedstawia nowe możliwości uczenia, jakie dają matematyczne quizy mobilne. Prezentujemy quizy napisane przy użyciu aplikacji MobileQuiz2 Uniwersytetu w Mannheim. Twórcy tej aplikacji uwzględnili specyficzne potrzeby matematyków. Podstawową trudnością wymagającą przezwyciężenia było użycie czcionki matematycznej i wykorzystanie apletów mobilnych np. GeoGerby. Powstały aplety ilustrujące poszczególne zagadnienia (do użycia np. na wykładzie, by każdy student mógł „poczuć pod palcem” abstrakcyjne obiekty matematyczne), quizy uczące – z podpowiedziami w formie apletów, bądź rysunków (idealne by ugruntować materiał), oraz quizy sprawdzające – bezcenne przed kolokwium czy egzaminem. Ze względu na dużą różnorodność quizów, mogę one być zabawą, jak i spektakularną formą powtórzenia materiału. Stanowią znakomite urozmaicenie zajęć i dzięki temu aktywizują do działania. Ponadto, wykładowca ma natychmiastową informację zwrotną. Z pewnością, możliwości quizów mobilnych w odniesieniu do matematyki nie zostały wyczerpane i warto zgłębiać ich tajniki

Characterizing nutrient distributions and fluxes in a eutrophic reservoir, Midwestern United States

Harmful algal blooms are increasingly common in aquatic ecosystems and have been linked to runoff from agricultural land. This study investigated the internal nutrient (i.e., phosphorus (P) and nitrogen (N)) dynamics of a eutrophic reservoir in the Midwestern United States to constrain the potential for sedimentary nutrients to stimulate harmful algal blooms. The spatial distribution of nutrients in the water column (soluble reactive P (SRP), nitrate/nitrite-N (NOx-N), and ammonium-N (NH4+-N)) and sediments (total P, total carbon (C), total N, and organic matter (OM)) were quantified and mapped. Water column nutrients varied spatially and temporally, with generally higher concentrations near the dam wall during normal lake levels. The upper portion of the lake, near the inlet, was sampled during a flood event and had overall higher nutrient concentrations and lower chlorophyll levels compared to normal lake level samples. Mean sedimentary total P (936 mg/kg) was ~ 30% higher in the reservoir than the surrounding upland soils, with the highest concentrations near the dam wall (1661 mg/kg) and a significant positive correlation found between sedimentary total P, total C, and OM. Additionally, 15 intact sediment cores were manipulated ex situ to examine mechanisms of nutrient flux across the sediment-water interface (SWI) that may trigger algal blooms. Core treatment conditions included advection (i.e., simulating potential nutrient fluxes during wind events through sediment resuspension) and diffusion. Core experiments indicated both advective and diffusive conditions at the SWI may trigger the flux of nutrients important for algal growth from lake sediments, with diffusion contributing both N and P to the water column, while intense advection increased water column N, but decreased P. Release of P to the water column may be more diffusion-driven than advection-driven, whereas N release to the water column appears to be both diffusion- and advection-driven