Please continue reading for information on the following events and opportunities:

• ASM/JGI Bioinformatics Institute: Incorporating Bioinformatics Research in Undergraduate Education
• Science Faculty with Education Specialties Project
• Workshops on Active Learning with Video Analysis
• Live Webcast of “Evolution in Extreme Environments” Symposium

This information is being provided through the BioQUEST blog but you should contact the individual projects (see embedded links below) for additional information.

============================================

ASM/JGI Bioinformatics Institute: Incorporating Bioinformatics Research in Undergraduate Education

Washington, DC, March 10-13, 2010
Application Deadline: November 15, 2009

Are you thinking about introducing bioinformatics into your curriculum?

At the ASM/JGI Bioinformatics Institute you will:

• LEARN to understand, interpret, and use molecular sequence information to solve problems and effectively teach it to your students.
• START to understand the underpinnings of BLAST – how the program works, and how to incorporate it.
• DISCOVER tools involved in weak-pattern searches and other protein analysis tools, comparative genomics, and evolutionary analysis.
• CONNECT to other faculty who are using bioinformatics in their classrooms.

For more information visit
http://www.facultyprograms.org/page02a.shtml

============================================

Science Faculty with Education Specialties Project

We are a group of Science Faculty with Education Specialties (SFES) interested in identifying other SFES across the nation.  While all college and university science faculty are education specialists in some regard, we define SFES here as individuals who either: 1) have been specifically hired in science departments to specialize in science education, OR 2) have transitioned to a role as a science faculty member focused on issues in science education after their initial hire.

If you are an SFES or think you might be an SFES, please complete our brief, 3-5 minute survey at the link below.
http://www.surveymonkey.com/National-SFES-Search

Beyond a national research study of SFES, our long-term goals are to foster a national SFES professional community and to promote cross-disciplinary SFES conversations.

Sincerely,

Seth Bush, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Nancy Pelaez, Purdue University
James Rudd, California State University, Los Angeles
Michael Stevens, California State University, Stanislaus
Kimberly Tanner, San Francisco State University
Kathy Williams, San Diego State University

============================================

Workshops on Active Learning with Video Analysis

January 5-7, 2010 in Orlando, Florida
July 12-16, 2010  in Portland, Oregon
Summer, 2011 at Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, NY

http://livephoto.rit.edu/workshops/

Video analysis is the use of video as a scientific measurement tool. Students find active learning with video capture and analysis both educational and compelling.

These NSF-funded workshops are for university and college faculty interested in using digital video analysis in student research, lectures, tutorials, homework assignments, and laboratories. They will cover techniques for making measurements in areas such as mechanics, thermodynamics, wave propagation, electricity, magnetism, and optics. Participants can apply these techniques in both chemistry and biology. Curricular materials and video clips will be provided to participants. Follow-up sessions and on-line communication will allow participants to share videos, activities and ideas for teaching.

There will be no tuition or fees for these workshops. Room and board for faculty and instructional staff from US institutions will be provided, and those with demonstrated need who teach under-represented students may apply for partial travel stipends.

============================================

Live Webcast of “Evolution in Extreme Environments” Symposium

Friday, November 13th, from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm, MST

Are you interested in evolution, but unable to attend this year’s National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT) conference in Denver?  Would you and your students like to learn more about evolution in “extreme environments”, such as high altitude, in the deep-sea, or in caves?  If so, you will be excited to learn that for the first time, the annual NABT Evolution Symposium will be accessible via a free, live webcast on Friday, Nov. 13th from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm, MST.

For full program information, including speaker names, talk titles and times, and the link to view the live webcast, please visit
http://www.nescent.org/NABT09Webcast.php

In addition, all of the talks will be recorded and placed on NESCent’s website for free access after the conference.

Share this post:

As you already know — Darwin is having a big year in 2009. All the incredible resources are providing great opportunities to learn, and teach more about evolution. I’ve listed a few of my favorites here and I hope that you will include others you have found useful in the comments section below. Here is a listing of the materials discussed below:

• The Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online
• Society for the Study of Evolution Birthday Card Video
• Scientific American Darwin Special Issue
• Year of Science Celebrates Evolution
• Science – Celebrating Darwin
• National Center for Science Education — Darwin in the Popular Press

The Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online

This is a comprehensive online collection including Darwin’s published works, his research notebooks, and related materials. It has resources for getting started (have you read the On the Origin of Species?), and materials for the serious scholar (you can find all 6 editions here). I have particularly enjoyed the collection of Darwin’s sketches of his specimens and the BBC audio book format of Darwin’s Beagle Diary.

Society for the Study of Evolution Birthday Card Video

From:

Robert Pennock, Chair, SSE Education Committee Thomas Meagher, Chair, SSE Darwin 200 Working Group To:

Evolution Directory (EvoDir) mailing list

We hope all have had a nice Birthday Celebration for Charles Darwin on 12 February. We invite you to view the SSE YouTube birthday greetings at the following link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn7zLGJE9EY.

This is a fun collection of evolutionary biologist singing and saying happy birthday to Chuck.

Scientific American Darwin Special Issue

I’ve often found that Scientific American strikes the right tone for introducing difficult scientific content to lay audiences. The January 2009 issue has a diverse collection of Darwin and evolution related articles includeing:

• Diversity Revealed: From Atoms to Traits. By David M. Kingsley Charles Darwin saw that random variations in organisms provide fodder for evolution. Modern scientists are revealing how that diversity arises from changes to DNA and can add up to complex creatures or even cultures.
• The Science of Spore–The “Evolution” of Gaming. By Ed Regis A computer game illustrates the difference between building your own simulated creature and real-life natural selection.
• The Evolutionary Origins of Hiccups and Hernias. By Neil H. Shubin How biological hand-me-downs inherited from fish and tadpoles evolved into human maladies.
• Putting Evolution to Use in the Everyday World. By David P. Mindell Understanding of evolution is fostering powerful technologies for health care, law enforcement, ecology, and all manner of optimization and design problems.

You can see the entire TOC here and all the articles are available online.

Year of Science Celebrates Evolution

The Year of Science 2009 (YoS09) is a national, year-long celebration of science. The goals of the project include engaging the public and improving public understanding about how science works, why it matters, and who scientists are. Each month has a different science theme and Evolution takes center stage in February. As an attempt to raise public awareness, I think the section call “Exploring Evolutionary Thought” is particularly useful. It includes brief interviews with more than 20 scientists in which they describe the role that evolution plays in their work.

Science – Celebrating Darwin

Science is celebrating the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and the 200th anniversary of the author’s birth with a variety of news features, scientific reviews and other special content, all collected here. The materials include:

• An ongoing companion blog titled “Origns: A History of Beginnings” which is organized into the categories, “All Things Darwin”, “Evolution and Culture”, “Origin Essays”, and “The Science of Origins”.
• Podcasts, book reviews and essays related to Darwin and evolution.
• Links to the February 6th issue which focuses on speciation (some of this content requires a subscription).

It should be interesting to watch this collection grow throughout the year.

National Center for Science Education — Darwin in the Popular Press

From a very useful compendium of popular press coverage of Darwin’s Anniversary at the National Center for Science Edcuation:

In recognition of Darwin’s 200th birthday, February 12, 2009, the mass media are again taking notice of Darwin’s life, accomplishments, and importance and influence. Writing to Charles Lyell in 1860, Darwin was wryly amused at the sort of newspaper coverage he was receiving in the wake of the publication of the Origin of Species: “I have received in a Manchester Newspaper a rather … good squib, showing that I have proved ‘might is right’, & therefore that Napoleon is right & every cheating Tradesman is also right.” Fortunately, today’s journalists exhibit a higher degree of accuracy than their Victorian colleagues at the Manchester Guardian! Herewith a sampling of the recent coverage of the Darwin bicentennial.

Click here to read the full post at the NCSE web site. I includes information about and links to content from Science News, National Public Radio, BBC, CBC, The New York Times and several more.

Share this post:

In their first issue of 2009 Science published a special issue on Education & Technology which includes,

… a range of articles in the research, opinion, news, and book review sections that examine how education is changing in the face of technology. Related videos and podcasts feature interviews with some of the authors.

Most of the materials require a subscription to view but the Introduction to the Special Issue is open access.

Here is the full list of articles by category.

REPORT: Why Peer Discussion Improves Student Performance on In-Class Concept Questions
EDITORIAL: Making a Science of Education
BOOKS: The Gamers’ Advancement of Learning
BOOKS: Inside the Schooled Mind
BOOKS: A Handbook for Hands-On Learning
BOOKS: What’s Wrong with Inferences from Test Scores?
PERSPECTIVES: Farewell, Lecture?
NEWS: NSF Rethinks Its Digital Library
NEWS: New Landscape for the Earth Sciences
NEWS: A Nobelist’s Passionate Pursuit of Excellence
NEWS: A Vision in Search of Funding
NEWS: Computers As Writing Instructors
NEWS: Glow Lights Up Scottish Classrooms
NEWS: Korea Tries to Level the Field
NEWS: A Personal Tutor for Algebra
PERSPECTIVE: Immersive Interfaces for Engagement and Learning
PERSPECTIVE: Education and Training Technology in the Military
PERSPECTIVE: Technology and Testing
PERSPECTIVE: Video Games: A Route to Large-Scale STEM Education?
PERSPECTIVE: Laptop Programs for Students
REVIEW: Online Education Today
REVIEW: Opening Education

Share this post: