Alternative to the Research Paper: Wiki Webpage Development

Instead of the typical research paper, our students are required to build wiki webpages as part of a larger, class project. Constructing a wikipage meets the same learning outcomes as a research paper, namely, library and internet research skills, distillation of material, written communication, and moreover, expands technology skills. Participants will discuss best practices for wiki project design, including logical organization, layout design, citation and plagiarism prevention. Examples presented will include a microbe encyclopedia and a human genome map defining genetic diseases. Following a wikipage-building exercise, participants will compare learning outcomes from research papers with wiki projects and discuss the potential uses of this community technology tool beyond the science discipline. Data evaluating student attitudes toward building wikipages and research papers and achievement of learning outcomes between research papers and wiki research projects will be presented

Adapting to Student Learning Styles: Using Cell Phone Technology in Undergraduate Science Instruction

Students of science traditionally make 3x5 flash cards to assist learning nomenclature, structures, and reactions. Advances in educational technology have enabled flashcards viewed on computers, offering an endless array of drilling and feedback opportunities for students. The current generation of students is less inclined to use computers, but they use their cell phones 24 hours a day. This report outlines these trends and an even more recent educational technology initiative, that of using cell phone flash cards to help students learn biology and chemistry nomenclature, structures, and reactions. Students responded positively to cell phone flash cards in a pilot study and a more detailed study is planned for the coming year

Assessment of Reading Speed and Comprehension in STEM Students at Georgia Gwinnett College

Faculty colleagues frequently assert that students have difficulty reading; students fail to read exam questions or lab instructions correctly. Additionally, students frequently report to faculty that college level texts are too hard to read. To investigate the scope of this problem, reading comprehension across the biology program was assessed. Students were asked to read a passage and mark their position when the time limit was called; students were then asked to answer a few questions and summarize the reading passage. These student reading comprehension scores are analyzed with regard to academic (e.g. GPA, college hours completed) and social metrics (e.g. English as a second language, first generation college student) to determine if correlations exist with student success and persistence. Data indicating the progress of reading comprehension through the degree program and data documenting the insufficiencies of student reading comprehension and speed will be presented. Since successful science students must understand and interpret literature that uses technical language appropriate to the field, we hope to document correlations between reading speed and comprehension and student success to better understand difficulties GGC STEM students encounter. Future studies may address remediation however this study is limited to assessing the problem

AXR2 Encodes a Member of the Aux/IAA Protein Family

The dominant gain-of-function axr2-1 mutation of Arabidopsis causes agravitropic root and shoot growth, a short hypocotyl and stem, and auxin-resistant root growth. We have cloned the AXR2 gene using a map-based approach, and find that it is the same as IAA7, a member of the IAA (indole-3-acetic acid) family of auxin-inducible genes. The axr2-1 mutation changes a single amino acid in conserved domain II of AXR2/IAA7. We isolated loss-of-function mutations in AXR2/IAA7 as intragenic suppressors of axr2-1 or in a screen for insertion mutations in IAA genes. A null mutant has a slightly longer hypocotyl than wild-type plants, indicating that AXR2/IAA7 controls development in light-grown seedlings, perhaps in concert with other gene products. Dark-grown axr2-1 mutant plants have short hypocotyls and make leaves, suggesting that activation of AXR2/IAA7 is sufficient to induce morphological responses normally elicited by light. Previously described semidominant mutations in two other Arabidopsis IAA genes cause some of the same phenotypes as axr2-1, but also cause distinct phenotypes. These results illustrate functional differences among members of the Arabidopsis IAA gene family