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Courses that I teach or have taught at UMaine:
click here for brief
descriptions
Undergraduate:
NFA 117 Issues & Opportunities in Marine Science
SMS 203 Integrative Marine Science Seminar (writing intensive)
SMS 402 Advanced Oceanography & Marine Biology
SMS 404 Capstone Seminar in Marine Sciences
Graduate:
SMS 514 Ecology of Marine Sediments
SMS 598 Marine Chemical Ecology
SMS 598 Marine Macrophysiology
SMS 598 Reproductive Ecology (last offered Fall 2001)
IMPORTANT NOTE: Students enrolled in SMS
203 should look for course information on the Synapse system.
Teaching tools I've found useful:
Like many other faculty members, I'm always looking out for new (or old)
ways to engage students in active learning, reinforce basic skills, and
encourage critical thinking. Here are a few activities I've used with
good success.
Quotes from a hat -- To encourage discussion in a large group,
I gather quotes from relevant articles, background facts, or reviews of
a certain topic, type them on slips of paper, and then have students draw
a quote from the hat. It's OK to have more than one copy of each quote.
To start discussion or keep it going after a lull, I ask a student to
read their quote and share their response to it.
The Graphing Detective -- this activity comes in two versions,
long and short. I use the long version (takes about an hour depending
on the students) to introduce basic skills of reading, interpreting, and
summarizing the information from an appropriate graph or figure. In this
version, I follow the format published by Pechenik and Tashiro (1992).
Students look at a figure without a legend first, and try to determine
what experiment was conducted and how it was conducted, based on just
the information displayed. Then we look at the figure legend to find out
what we missed. I also ask students what information the legend does not
tell them. Next we talk about what the figure means. As a homework assignment,
I ask students to write a paragraph describing the experiment that produced
the results and summarizing what can be concluded from the results presented
in the figure. In the short version, I ask students to work with a neighbor
to first determine what data are being shown in a given figure, and then
what can be concluded from the data. After 5 minutes we re-group and discuss
our interpretation of the figure.
Pechenik, J.A. & J.S. Tashiro. 1992. The graphing detective:
An exercise in critical reading, experimental design, and data analysis.
American Biology Teacher 54(7): 432-435
Eco-Beaker simulations: EcoBeaker,
by SimBiotic, is a really nice teaching software that lets students manipulate
simulations of several classic experiments in marine, terrestrial and
aquatic ecology. Simulations that worked well in my classes include: Keystone
Predator, Aquatic Trophic Cascades, and Limiting Nutrients.
NFA 117 Issues & Opportunities in Marine
Science
An orientation class for incoming students majoring in
marine sciences and aquaculture (Last taught Fall 2003)
SMS 203 Integrative Marine Science Seminar
Using examples from current marine science research, students
explore the nature of inquiry, elements of experimental design, data presentation,
elementary statistics, and interpretation of scientific papers. Emphasis
is placed on developing science writing skills. Hands on activities introduce
basic concepts in the biology of marine organisms. Satisfies the General
Education Writing Intensive Requirement. (Offered every Spring)
SMS 402 Advanced Oceanography & Marine Biology
Stresses the interdisciplinary nature of marine science
by focusing on comprehensive oceanographic and marine biological processes
that reinforce geological, chemical, physical and biological principles
and their linkages. Explores in greater depth topics introduced in earlier
required courses. (With Fei Chai, last taught Spring 2005)
SMS 404 Capstone Seminar in Marine Science
Seminar required of all SMS students, preferably in the
semester before SMS 400 is first elected. Students research and discuss
selected special topics in marine sciences and prepare their capstone
project proposal. Topics also include scientific ethics, peer review,
and strategies for effective scientific communication.
SMS 514 Ecology of Marine Sediments
A multi-disciplinary examination of factors influencing
ecological patterns and processes in marine sediments. Emphasis on recent
research integrating biological, geological, physical and chemical aspects
of marine sedimentary environments. (May term class at the Darling Marine
Center)
SMS 598 Marine Chemical Ecology
Marine organisms literally
live in a sea of chemicals, and chemical signals play a central role in
many important community processes including predator-prey interactions,
recruitment, mating, and feeding. In this lecture and discussion class,
we will examine the chemical mechanisms that control intra- and interspecific
interactions among marine and aquatic organisms from cellular, physiological,
organismal, evolutionary, and applied perspectives.
SMS 598 Marine Macrophysiology
Macrophysiology is an emergent field of study
that integrates ecological physiology with macroecology to investigate
variation in physiological traits over large geographic and temporal scales,
and the ecological implications of that variation. Recent work has emphasized
understanding & predicting how marine species will respond to climate
change based on their physiology, and the role physiological performance
plays in the spread of marine invasive species. This lecture and discussion
class reviews key physiological processes that influence marine organismal
ecology, examines large-scale variation in physiological traits among
different taxa,and explores the relationship between taxonomic variation
and ecosystem functioning.
SMS 598 Reproductive Ecology
Examines the ecology
and evolution of life histories from theoretical and empirical perspectives.
Topics included measurement of reproductive effort/success, discussion
of major life history strategies (semelparity, iteroparity, planktotrophy,
lecithotrophy), mating system evolution, sexual selection, and evolution
of parental care. Primary focus in on marine organisms. (with Paul Rawson
and Susan Brawley, last taught Fall 2001)
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Students on NFA 117 field trip to
the Darling Marine Center (Fall 2002).
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Introducing some intertidal inhabitants. (NFA
117, SMS 203)
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How do you describe spionid
polychaete deposit feeding behaviors? (SMS 514)
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SMS 203 students investigated how the marine worm Nereis virens
responds to reduced salinity; these are some of the data they collected
in class.(Spring 2005) |
SMS 203: Nereis virens, a very cool worm (photo
by Dan Dauer) |
Some Teaching
Links:
(will launch new windows)
Teaching
Issues & Experiments in Ecology
from the Ecological Society of America
National
Center for Case Study Teaching in Science
some marine-related cases in the Ecology & Environment collection
GoMOOS:
Gulf of Maine Ocean Observing System
create and download oceanographic data from the Gulf of Maine
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