| Fellows: |
August Ralston and Robert Jolly |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Agribusiness in Liberalizing Economies: An International Education
Self-Paced Learning System" |
| Description: |
The same technology that led to the WorldWide Web and Internet
can also revolutionize resident instruction at Iowa State University.
This project will develop an educational intranet that will allow
undergraduate students in Agriculture and Business to explore how
the collapse of socialism and central planning throughout the world
will revolutionize agriculture and agribusinesses. This transition
is occurring at a rapid pace in countries as diverse as Russia, Vietnam,
Kenya, and Peru. Students of agriculture and business need to understand
these events -- from the economic fundamentals of price liberalization
to the challenges facing managers in the transition economies. The
proposed intranet is a comprehensive, self-paced interactive learning
system that takes full advantage of developments in hypertext technologies.
Whether it serves as the basis for a free-standing course or as a
supplement to existing courses, the intranet will provide a current
and relevant educational experience for students interested in agribusiness
in liberalizing economics. |
|
| Fellows: |
Barbara Licklider, Robert Brown, Paul DeJong, Don Flugrad, Jennifer
Lucero-Leslie, Ivan Maldonado, Steve Mickelson, Frank Rizzo, Howard
Shapiro, Jon Van Gerpen, Judy Vance, Loren Zachary, Brenda Diesslin,
Brian Keller, Pat Carlson, and Tony Netusil |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Project LEA/RN: Leadership Development" |
| Description: |
The purpose of LEA/RN Leadership Development is to respond to the
growing interest among faculty in student-centered learning, by preparing
a core set of faculty members to lead faculty development. Participants
in LEA/RN Leadership Development will:
- use effective group facilitation skills;
- demonstrate knowledge and practice of effective teaching
skills;
- enhance student learning, particularly in 100/200 level
courses;
- initiate cross-departmental/-college curriculum development;
and
- form a cadre of faculty to provide assistance to others.
Within an environment that incorporates research-based components
of effective faculty development, participants will explore pedagogical
and learning theories and their implications for effective teaching.
LEA/RN Leadership Development maximizes faculty expertise to achieve
the strategic goals to improve the quality of undergraduate education
inherent in the strategic plans of the University, colleges, and
departments, and establishes a university-wide network to support
continued improvement. |
|
| Fellows: |
Hector Avalos, Karen Donaldson, Larry Ebbers, Lynn Graham, Suzanne
Hendrich, Theresa McCormick, Corly Petersen, and Mary Sawyer |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Developing Curriculum Integration Models for Diversity Education
at ISU" |
| Description: |
The long term goal of this project is to develop and enhance the
ability of the entire ISU faculty to successfully incorporate multiculturalism
and diversity into our teaching and curricula, a goal central to
successful implementation of the new ISU diversity requirement and
to the 1995-2000 University Strategic Plan. The primary initial effort
of this project is to develop a guide, "Curriculum Integration Approaches
to Diversity Education at ISU," that will be broadly disseminated
to faculty to assist in the development of their expertise in incorporating
significant multiculturalism into their courses and curricula. This
project will involve updating the ISU Diversity Resource Guide, identification
of faculty expertise in specific diversity-related areas, preparation
of diversity-related biographies, regular meetings of the project
team for in-depth discussion of issues related to multicultural education,
and travel to national meetings and to other institutions to interact
with colleagues to develop workable approaches to diversity education
for ISU. The project team will work closely with the Center for Teaching
Excellence to develop effective means for disseminating the projects
of our project. |
|
| Fellows: |
Lisa Fontaine, Gregory Palermo, Robert Harvey, Lynn Paxson, John
Cunnally, and John Weinkein |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Plato's Cave" |
| Description: |
Plato's Cave is a cooperative effort within the College of Design
between the faculty and the Visual Resources Collection to provide
a significant, diverse, and vital on-line resource for undergraduate
study and research. This shared resource will take the form of a
large database of critical images, data, and instructor's annotations
available through most computers on campus. Plato's Cave will include
original images from faculty collections and images from the Visual
Resources Collection, an instructional resource of over 130,000 slides
documenting major works in the fields of Architecture, Landscape
Architecture, Planning, Art, Craft, and Design including works by
women artists and African-American artists and also the art and architecture
of Asia and American Indians. This material, which is currently unavailable
to students for individual study, will be an extraordinary asset
for students in the College of Design and also for students throughout
the university. |
|
| Fellows: |
Lawrence Genalo and Charles Wright |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Toying With Technology" |
| Description: |
This project represents the development of a technology literacy
course aimed at students in non-technical fields who want an appreciation
for the technological innovations that surround them. The course
we propose, which we will call "Toying With Technology," will be
designed to explain the principles behind many of the technological
innovations in wide use today. We will do this via a collection of
hands-on laboratory experiences based upon simple systems constructed
out of LEGOs and controlled by small microcomputers. These laboratory
experiences will be designed to lead students, literally by their
hands- on experimentation, through the use of technology in support
of many everyday activities. These laboratory experiences will be
simple enough to isolate and illuminate the underlying basic principles
and yet be complex enough to represent real-world examples. |
|
| Fellows: |
Max Gunzberger, Kenneth Heimes, Richard Miller, Ron Nelson, and
Frank Rizzo |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Calculus: An Integrated 3-Track, High Technology Approach" |
| Description: |
In order to improve the learning and performance of students in
freshman engineering and science and calculus, we propose to examine,
develop, and implement four experiments in the relevant courses.
First, we consider the integration of calculus and freshman engineering
courses; thus, by seeing the use of calculus skills in an engineering
setting, students will be better motivated to study for their calculus
courses. Second, we study the use of multiple-track calculus courses
consisting of tailored courses that cater to poorly prepared students,
outstanding students, as well as regular students; thus we can at
the same time slow the pace for poorly prepared students and enhance
the calculus experience for good students. Third, we study the fully
integrated use of high-technology materials in and out of the classroom
with the aim of enhancing motivation as well as delivery of information.
Fourth, we study the use of readily accessible web-site materials
that can be used by students to obtain help in understanding lectures
and homework materials. |
|
| Fellow: |
Margaret Graham |
| Proposal
Title: |
"The Writing Community: Redesigning Freshman English" |
| Description: |
The Writing Community is a project to redesign freshman English.
This project will involve annually approximately 12 senior-level
faculty and 24 teaching assistants, and will affect approximately
2,100 students the first year, and at least 3,900 students the second
year and every year thereafter. The Miller grant will be used to
1) design the curriculum around the expertise of senior-level faculty
who will re- enter the freshman English classroom, 2) increase the
effectiveness of computer pedagogy, 3) introduce cross-cultural issues
into the curriculum, 4) achieve greater consistency in the freshman
English program, and 5) measure the success of the Writing Community
project. |
|
| Fellows: |
Margaret Mahoney and Carol David |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Expanding the Services of the Writing Center with Studio Classes
and On-Line Tutoring" |
| Description: |
This project proposes the implementation of Writing Studio classes
for students at risk in their first semester of freshman English.
In this program, students meet in small groups each week, working
through problems that arise in their English 104 course. Meeting
with their peers and an experienced teacher, they would be more likely
to develop positive attitudes about writing and internalize successful
writing strategies to improve their writing processes. As a supplement
to the Writing Studio, we will pilot test an on-line tutoring service,
allowing the Writing Studio students to expand their access to the
Writing Center during the fall semester and allowing us to develop
materials for the expansion of the on-line program in the spring.
Such improvements to the freshman experience will provide much needed
individualized assistance to weaker students and positively impact
all students' recruitment, retention, and success. |
|
| Fellow: |
Nenad Kostic |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Improvements in Teaching and Learning of Descriptive Chemistry
in Courses Chem 164 and Chem 178" |
| Description: |
Approximately 900 undergraduates, mostly freshmen, enroll in the
courses Chem 164 and Chem 178 every year. One or the other of these
courses is required in more than 70 majors and curricula across the
university and is a prerequisite for numerous other courses. Unfortunately,
the drop-out rate and the grades have not significantly improved
when the course content was adjusted and when help of various kinds
was offered to the students.
This is a proposal for a conceptual, but not a radical, change
in the way in which descriptive chemistry, traditionally the
most difficult aspect of these courses, is taught and learned.
Inductive and deductive approaches to chemical reactivity will
be combined. Students will be taught to reason and to correct
their mistakes. Lecture demonstrations involving students will
be developed and introduced to show the empirical basis of descriptive
chemistry and to develop students' skills of observation and
analysis. Preliminary results from the author's pedagogical experiments
in these two courses bode well for the success of the project. |
|
| Fellow: |
Thomas Greenbowe |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Infusing New Methods and Techniques in All Introductory Chemistry
Courses: A Student Centered Approach" |
| Description: |
Introductory chemistry is a required course for many students at
Iowa State University. Many students experience difficulty passing
the course. This project will pilot test a series of enhancements
and improvements to all of the general chemistry courses. The overall
goal is to increase the percentage of students who are successful
with their introductory chemistry courses and to improve retention. |
|
| Fellows: |
X. Daniel Fang and T. Kesavadas |
| Proposal
Title: |
"Using Virtual Reality Machining to Enhance the Teaching and Learning
of an Undergraduate Manufacturing Course" |
| Description: |
A common problem in teaching undergraduate manufacturing courses
involving machining is the difficulty of arranging appropriate machining
experiments for a number of possible reasons, such as limitations
on laboratory facilities, insufficient support of technicians, large
size of class, limited funds for running the costly experiments,
safety considerations, etc. Lack of physical understanding about
the machining undermines the learning effectiveness in this course.
The goal of the proposed project is to develop a virtual reality
(VR) machining system with specific objectives to help students
in obtaining important "hands on" machining experience, enhance
their physical understanding of machining principles, and promote
their latent learning capability. In such a virtual environment,
all the students have a "one-to-one" opportunity to "physically" operate
various types of machines on their own.
The significance of the proposed project is that it can be
used as a national model for future machining laboratories with
the advantages of significant cost-effectiveness, knowledge-integrated
interactive learning environment, and great flexibility. |
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