A City State-of-Mind: Creating Effective Assignments for Urban Students
December 13, 2009 - 9:00 am to 5:00 pm
San Francisco, CA in conjunction with the 2009 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting
Teaching earth science in urban classrooms can be challenging due to extreme student diversity and a disconnect from the natural environment. An understanding of what education research has discovered about motivations and support for learning by urban youth can help you design more effective courses and assignments that take advantage of student strengths and urban resources. This workshop will introduce key design principles for urban geoscience curricula, and guide you through the process of improving/designing an assignment for a geoscience course that is taught in an urban college setting.
This workshop can help geology faculty on urban campuses design course materials that are better suited to their students. In addition, senior graduate students and post-docs who are seeking employment at an urban college can further benefit from this workshop in that it will provide experience with respect to teaching priorities of search committees in geoscience departments in urban settings.
Workshop Conveners
- Wayne Powell, Brooklyn College, City University of New York
This workshop is one of the On the Cutting Edge follow-on workshops which are designed to disseminate themes and outcomes from a larger workshop. This workshop is part of the On the Cutting Edge professional development program for current and future geoscience faculty, and is sponsored by the National Association of Geoscience Teachers with funding provided by a grant from the National Science Foundation - Division of Undergraduate Education.
