Why are feedback loops difficult to teach and learn? part of Earth and Mind:Posts
Although the feedback loop concept has strong explanatory power, a number of cognitive and practical problems can make it hard to teach and learn. Practical problems include: use of the terms "positive" ...

A Curriculum by Design Part II: Student Learning Outcomes and Program Assessment part of Earth and Mind:Posts
In an earlier blogpost (A Curriculum by Design) I outlined the philosophy and process we used in the Department of Earth Sciences, Montana State University, to revise our undergraduate curriculum. This continuing ...

Should we be talking with our Earth & Environmental Science students about voting? part of Earth and Mind:Posts
A recent study has found that undergraduates' rate of voting varies by major, with STEM majors falling at the bottom of the heap. Since so many issues at the intersection of Earth Systems and human systems ...

Curriculum by Design part of Earth and Mind:Posts
The Department of Earth Sciences, Montana State University, recently implemented a top to bottom revision of its curriculum. We are a department that encompasses both geology and geography, and we have degree ...

Put a Little ART in your EARTH Science part of Earth and Mind:Posts
C.P. Snow famously wrote about "The Two Cultures"[1]—that great divide between the sciences and humanities. Snow argued that the inability of scientists/engineers and scholars of the arts/humanities to ...

Data Visualization as Rorschach Test part of Earth and Mind:Posts
A single data visualization--a time series graph of global death rate--elicited three wildly different interpretations. This reminds us that (a) data interpreters bring their own priorities and domain expertise to ...

Is the Fourth Paradigm Really New? part of Earth and Mind:Posts
Author suggests that the so-called "Fourth Paradigm" of Science, in which insights are development through examination of vast troves of already existing data, has been in use in geosciences for ...

Reinforcing feedback loops power effective communities of practice part of Earth and Mind:Posts
A "community of practice" is "a group of people who share a concern or passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly." Effective communities of practice ...

The story behind "Last Call" part of Earth and Mind:Posts
The documentary film "Last Call" depicts the making of the book Limits to Growth in the early 1970's, its subsequent vilification throughout the 1980's and 90's, and then finally the ...

What do COVID-19, climate change, feuds and explosions have in common? part of Earth and Mind:Posts
This piece places the COVID-19 pandemic into a larger framework as an example of a runaway reinforcing feedback loop, drawing analogies to both Earth and non-Earth systems. This framework can help readers ...