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ASPB EDUCATION
FORUM
ASPB
Exhibit at National Science Teachers Association Conference 2005
ASPB and Wisconsin
Fast Plants (WFP) once again were partners in a double exhibit booth for
the 2005 National Science Teachers Association conference in Dallas, Texas.
The conference ran from March 31 to April 3. The WFP team was headed by
Paul and Coe Williams, and ASPB was represented by Suzanne Cunningham
and Sherry Fulk-Bringman of Purdue University’s Agronomy Outreach
Department and ASPB Education Committee chair Larry Griffing of Texas
A&M University.
“The NSTA meeting
is a great place for ASPB members to talk with all kinds of teachers
and teacher educators,” reported Griffing. “It is somewhat humbling,
being a much bigger meeting than many scientific society meetings, such
as ours. There were 10,000 attendees at the conference and many, many
exhibitors. We probably had 1,000–2,000 people come by the combined
booth to interact with us. Many were interested in hearing about
current research in plant biology. I spent several hours explaining what
the Plant Physiology 2004 poster was all about to many attendees.
It was a nice attention-grabber and it was very interesting to hear
what people had to say about it. There was considerable interest
in Arabidopsis as a model organism and how teachers could put Arabidopsis
into the classroom along with Fast Plants. Many more teachers were interested
in just getting more plant biology into their classroom.”
Wisconsin Fast
Plants
Griffing remarked
how the WFP program does such a splendid job of placing plant science
in the classroom. “The teachers are really interested in them, and
the WFP group does an amazing job with the teachers. I noticed that although
Fast Plants are carried by Carolina Biological, the main activity in Fast
Plants was at our booth where there were many active demonstrations, new
ideas, and some nice Fast Plant necklace freebies. On the other hand,
the Carolina Fast Plant display had, when I saw it, hardly anyone at it.
The continued enthusiasm and insight of Paul and Coe Williams and Dan
Lauffer and other WFP staff is a joy to behold.”
Coe Williams conveyed
the thoughts of the WFP staff when she reported, “Overall it was
a most satisfactory and positive outreach experience. Although we on the
WFP side of the booth were not doing the screening of booth visitors,
our guess is that the vast majority of teachers were from Texas or nearby
states. Given the fact that our booth was in the farthest corner of the
convention hall, we felt that the number of visitors was pretty fantastic.
We heard several people say, ‘You guys always have good, new stuff,’
which made us think that certain teachers are indeed seeking out the booth
year after year.”
The WFP program offered
three “make and take” activities, two of which were offered
at any given time. The staff was kept busy. “For the first day-and-a-half,
we were two deep at both activity tables. It was gratifying that teachers
were still showing up on Sunday morning to make and take an activity.
We had three to four people working the booth at any given time: Dan Lauffer,
Paul Williams, and Coe Williams; Hedi Baxter from the System-wide Change
for All Learners and Educators (SCALE) program; and Whitney Hagins and
Ken Bateman, teachers at Lexington High School in Massachusetts.”
One WFP activity was
a seed germination necklace, complete with little “tools” and
a water container (essentially a necklace with three microcentrifuge tubes)
with an accompanying question, “How fast are Fast Plants?” WFP
had pre-prepped with 500 copies of the instruction card to start. By Friday
night the WFP staff were back at Kinko’s and Home Depot, having another
300 copies of the instructions printed and buying more nylon cord for
the necklaces and then prepping more “seed wedges” at the hotel.
All 800 of the instruction postcards were dispensed, and the staff estimate
that teachers made 1,000 germination necklaces. Some even came back a
second time with colleagues to have them make a necklace. The last couple
of necklaces were made on Sunday morning.
The second WFP activity
was a “Discovery Cup” garden complete with a live sow bug and
dead ladybug. The Discovery Cups were little portion cups that were also
strung onto a necklace. Into each one went four tiny plants: a selaginella,
a moss, a heartwort, and a kalanchoe. The sow bug also went into the cups
with a bit of “habitat,” whereas the ladybug was put into a
microcentrifuge tube and teachers were asked to decide what to do with
the ladybug. The sow bug was added to address the question of what the
sow bug would choose to eat. The ladybug came with a question: “What
purpose does the ladybug serve; or why a ladybug?” Through ongoing
observation, the teachers will find that the ladybug provides an excellent
source of fertilizer for the plants in their Discovery Cups. The activity
was called “Discovery Cup Garden Necklace—Sow Bug’s Quest.”
This was the “necklace” that caught the attention of teachers
all over the convention hall. WFP gave away 500 of those and could have
done more, since they ran out mid-afternoon on Saturday. In total, 2,000
tiny plants were given away in the Discovery Cup necklaces. WFP stated,
“We owe our thanks to Dr. Lisa Darmo at Carolina Biological for providing
the sow bugs.”
The third WFP activity
began on Saturday afternoon and was offered until the convention closed.
This was a phototropism activity in a film can called “Which Color
Do Plants Lean Toward—Red, Green or Blue?” It involved three
colored windows punched into a film can and three germinating Fast Plants
seeds inside. Coe Williams explained, “We decided on this activity
this year because we thought it would complement the work being done by
Roger Hangarter. Two hundred of these experiments were set up and taken
away by teachers.”
Also featured in the
Fast Plants side of the booth was a new Plant Light Box display made from
plastic crates. This is a low-cost method for educators to create a light
box. The plastic crates can be purchased at any of the office supply outlets
for $6 to $8, and, with the spiral light and cord, can be put together
for growing plants in the classroom for under $15.
At each corner of
the two “hands-on tables” was an “umbrella tree” from
which were hanging various bottle biology constructions such as the “film
can hand lens” and mature Discovery Cup gardens. On the back tables
were Plant Light Boxes with several Fast Plants growing systems, genetic
stocks, and one Plant Light House with the Brassica butterfly.
Purdue Agronomy
Outreach
The Purdue Agronomy
display was also very hands-on and informative for K–12 teachers,
being quite popular and busy all the time. An abundant supply of experiments
and a handout for educators on how to obtain both the printed and online
version of K–12 experiments was available from Purdue’s Agronomy
Outreach Department. Suzanne Cunningham and Sherry Fulk-Bringman conducted
a “smiling faces” experiment using corn seeds, starch/agar gels,
saliva, and iodine. They also demonstrated the “digestion in action”
experiment showing the process of starch digestion and discussing the
role enzymes play in seed germination and food digestion. They discussed
with teachers how the educators could explain enzymes to their students
and creatively demonstrate how enzymes work using Lego™ blocks and
jigsaw puzzles—especially effective for ninth-grade biology. Purdue
staff displayed experiments illustrating soil characteristics such as
electric charge (clays/ organic matter have a negative charge), texture
(great for youngsters), and color. In addition, they showed water binding
capacity (applicable to high school environmental courses), how plants
and mulch prevent erosion (bottle experiment shown last year with expanded
applications), the role of vermiculite in our potting soil (why it holds
so much water), and how nutrients bind to soil and the role of plants
in preventing nitrate leaching.
Interaction with educators
helped the Purdue staff refine its own presentation methods. “I think
we are going to rewrite our lab text applying these inexpensive techniques
and applying each experiment to plant and soil science,” said Suzanne
Cunningham. For a title she was inspired by the phrase “Dirt
Cheap Hands-on Experiments in Plant and Soil Science.” Purdue Outreach
had examples of activities for children of all ages and gave out a handout
showing access to its website. Throughout the four-day event, staff were
tweaking their experiments to show teachers how they could be applied
to the grade level being instructed or the particular subject matter being
presented.
ASPB Education
Outreach
Larry Griffing observed,
“ASPB really has some great ‘hooks’ for teachers as well.
The two flyers ‘How Many Plants in a Fast Food Burger?’ and
‘Plants in the House’ are quite popular. The 12 Principles
of Plant Biology brochure is a wonderful way for ASPB to get across
some key concepts and stand for something, connecting with the teachers
as an organization in a way that is useful and edifying for them and their
students. The bookmarks are very popular.” Two other exhibits were
ones sponsored partly from ASPB Education Foundation Grants. One was a
DVD presentation of images from Roger Hangarter’s (Indiana University)
website “Plants in Motion” (http://plantsinmotion.bio.indiana.edu).
The other display was sent by Peggy Lemaux, University of California at
Berkeley, depicting how genetics relates to food. This was accompanied
by five different “baseball cards” of DNA/genetic information:
“What Is DNA?,” “Classical Genetics,” “New Genetics,”
“Genetics at Work,” and “How Much DNA Do You Eat?”
For those who want additional information on how to “rent” their
own informational display, visit Lemaux’s website at lemauxpg@nature.berkeley.edu.
Griffing wondered
about the value of having a presence at NSTA: “Will teachers go away
knowing the ASPB name and logo?” He answered his own question with,
“Maybe not right away, but as we continue our presence and continue
to be associated with these great ways for individuals to take scientific
investigation into the classroom, it will come.” The ASPB Education
Committee plans to conduct a follow-up survey of more than 320 attendees
whose information was captured at the booth.
This article is
a compilation of reports from Larry Griffing, Coe and Paul Williams, and
Suzanne Cunningham.
ASPB
Education Forum (continued): Summer Undergraduate Research
Fellowship 2005 Recipients
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