To broaden perspectives presented in undergraduate courses, instructors often invite guest speakers, yet there is limited research on students' perceptions of guest speakers and the potential influence they may have on student learning. In this exploratory study, we describe how senior undergraduate students, in a natural resource management…

Burgeoning college enrolments and insufficient funding to higher education have expanded the use of large lecture courses. As this trend continues, it is important to ensure that students can still learn in those challenging learning environments. Within education broadly and undergraduate engineering specifically, active learning pedagogies have…

The decision to employ learner-centered teaching methods, teacher-centered teaching methods, or whether to integrate the two within large lecture halls in higher education continues to be heavily researched and hotly debated. All, in one form or another, have been shown effective at varying levels, throughout a myriad of disciplines and across…

This study sought to compare a data-rich learning (DRL) environment that utilized online data as a tool for teaching about renewable energy technologies (RET) to a lecture-based learning environment to determine the impact of the learning environment on students' knowledge of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) concepts related…

The laboratory experiment, which acts as a capstone, integrated lecture-laboratory exercise involving solution preparation, pH buffers, [E[subscript]H] (reduction potential) buffers, organic reaction mechanisms, reaction kinetics, and instrumental analysis is presented. The students completing the lecture and laboratory exercises could gain a…

Participation of environmental chemistry students in mock congressional hearings is described, as a means of helping them better develop their speaking and debating skills. The activity brings active learning principles into the classroom and greatly increases student participation in an otherwise traditional lecture course.

The population growth together with the unsustainable consumption pattern is putting increasing stress on the planet's natural resources. The increasing realisation that humans are harming the environment is taking the form of a global movement intended to change behaviour towards sustainability, now recognised as a framework that links humans to…

This paper presents a description of events in two classrooms, during December 1972 and February 1973, in which the main topic were environment, resources, population, and family planning. (Author)

Presents the ozone depletion story as an excellent case study for the integration of science-related social issues into the college science curriculum. Describes the history of ozone depletion and efforts to remedy the problem. Provides a lecture outline on ozone depletion. Discusses integrating other science-related interdisciplinary topics in…

An experimental study sought to determine if simulation-type games could teach a given body of material as effectively as the traditional lecture method. Graduate students in a Human Ecology course were divided into experimental and control groups; the former played the Community Land Use Game (CLUG), the latter attended lectures. Posttests…

This research tested the hypothesis that students' erroneous mental models about groundwater will change towards more valid concepts if they are taught on the basis of a mental model-building strategy that focuses on the clarification of students' misconceptions. To examine the hypothesis a quasi-experimental research design was chosen. The…