Resources
National Academies report
Data Science for Undergraduates: Opportunities and Options
Showcased projects:
Software and Data
Software
- EdGCM is an educational package of a climate model that students can run.
- The programming language R.
Data
Disciplinary
Teaching materials
- Critical Algorithm Studies: a Reading List
- Wesleyan Quantitative Analysis Center
- Berkeley Data Science Modules Short explorations into data science that give students some instruction on the principles of data analysis, statistics, and computing.
- LACOL Q-LAB mini quantitative skills lessons developed by LACOL
- Online textbook: Introduction to Statistical Learning with applications in R (ISLR) It has an excellent pedagogical style and provides excellent datasets for training the readers in one of the most rigorous tools in Data science and analytics, R.
- Developing Student Understanding of Complex Systems, while written with a focus on geoscience, provides information that can be used across different disciplines.
- Climate Models Resources
- Teaching Computation in the Sciences including approaches to computational thinking, data analysis, modeling, and visualization
- Teach the Earth- Environmental Science teaching activites
- QuIRK: Quantitative inquiry, Reasoning, and Knowledge from Carleton, including example assignments, skills, courses, and assessments
- Data Journalism Workbench This entry level course teaches students how to answer questions with data in a transparent and reproducible manner, without the need to code. Students learn how to filter, group, create charts, fix common data formatting issues, and combine different data sets. You'll also learn about useful calculations like per capita rates, percentage change, and adjusting for inflation. Along the way, students work with data that journalists commonly use, including campaign finance, crime, housing, and environmental data.
- Introduction to R for Data Science Discover big data: work with airline data to learn the fundamentals of the R platform. This online course uses airline data to demonstrate key concepts involved in the analysis of big data. In this course you will learn how to use the R platform to manage data. The course serves as an introduction to the R software. It lays the foundation for anyone to begin studying data science and its applications, or to prepare learners to take more advanced courses related to data science, such as machine learning and computational statistics.
Course Material
- Course on social network analysis, taught by anthropologist
- InTeGrate Courses and Modules - these extensively reviewed materials engage students in understanding the earth system as it intertwines with key societal issues. They challenge students to address interdisciplinary problems, engage in geoscientific habits of mind, work with authentic geoscience data and develop system thinking. The collection is freely available and ready to be adapted by undergraduate educators across a range of courses including: general education or majors courses in Earth-focused disciplines such as geoscience or environmental science, social science, engineering, and other sciences, as well as courses for interdisciplinary programs.
- Earth Modeling course from the InTeGrate project, provides qualitative and quantitative tools for constructing, experimenting with, and interpreting dynamic models of different components of the Earth system. The integrated set of ten modules within this course explores a range of systems that all relate to the dynamics of Earth's climate, including interactions with humans. The course is aimed at an intermediate-level geoscience student with some knowledge of mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology, which form the foundation for building and understanding computer models of these systems.
- Systems Thinking module, from the InTeGrate Project, prepares students to address complex systems issues for a sustainable future by 1) identifying the parts of a system and explaining how the parts interact, 2) developing skills to model complex systems using data and examples relevant to the course and 3) applying a systems approach to evaluate a societal challenge. This InTeGrate module fills a key need to educate students about the importance of the systems approach, uses examples that involve data and the construction and manipulation of systems models, and helps students approach complex, interdisciplinary problems.
- Map Your Hazards! – Assessing Hazards, Vulnerability and Risk module, from the InTeGrate project, is a 3-week interdisciplinary module provides students an interactive mechanism to engage in place-based exploration of natural hazards, social vulnerability, risk and the factors that shape their community's perception of natural hazards and risk. Students integrate interdisciplinary geoscience and social science methodologies to understand societal impacts that result from natural hazards.
- Project EDDIE: Environmental Data-Driven Inquiry & Exploration provides a set of modules/activities that integrate environmental data into the classroom. Sister project, EDDIE Macrosystems, is also developing modules.
- Pedagogies in Action offers more than 50 modules on the what, why, and how to teach with effective pedagogic methods, including some example activities. Example modules:
- Direct Measurement Videos pairs short videos with classroom-ready activities into the introductory mechanics curriculum.
Program Design