outreach « The Free-Choice Learning Laboratory at HMSC

There’s nothing like a little guilt to set you on a new path. My adventures with writing these blog posts actually started because I felt guilty that some members of the Free Choice Learning Lab were doing a lot more to contribute to the group than I tend to do. Part of that is because I have historically been a bit of an interloper in the lab group anyway. Even though it is called the Free Choice Lab group, it has predominantly been comprised of the grad students working with Shawn Rowe, mostly out at the Hatfield Marine Science Center, and the few of us who work with other FCL faculty and projects have always been welcome to attend any of the group’s events (and I have felt welcome!), but we were outsiders. While this is currently changing and the other FCL groups are being more actively included in the webpage and such, this is how it has been for most of my time at Oregon State. This is compounded by the fact that I am a commuter student, driving up from Eugene, and I usually only attend meetings if I am on campus, of if the technology is not being totally frustrating for me to call or internet in, in some fashion. Needless to say, I let those who were regular members of the group shoulder most of the responsibilities for organizing meetings and retreats and writing for the blog and other such tasks.

However, this is a lovely group of people, and many of my favorite people that I have met in grad school, are part of this group, and I do care about them. So, when three active members, Laura Good, Katie Stofer, and Harrison Baker all graduated in the spring of 2013 and went on to jobs elsewhere, I could tell that if some other people didn’t step in and take on some of the work, my dear friends would be doing even more than their share! So, I tentatively agreed to write for the blog. At first, I was non-committal- “sure, I can be a guest blogger on occasion”, but as the topic kept coming up in meetings, I decided that once a month really was not that much to ask, so agreed to take on a regular stint.

And, to my surprise, this has been fun! This type of writing comes much more naturally to me than the academic style that is usually asked of me (sorry to anyone who helps edit my “real” papers!) and I even like thinking about what I will write my next post about, as I go about my month. I think I am funny, in a witty sort of way, and I appreciate the soap box from which to ponder and rant.

And, the best part is, that the universe is once again reminding me that when you do the “right thing” (i.e. helping out my friends) good things happen! Because of this blogging gig, I have been able to talk myself in to being a guest blogger for a pretty big technology in education conference later this month (ISTE), and a blog they asked me to write about Make as a lead up to the conference was posted through another on-line education website! On top of that, the fun FCL performance group Eepy Bird, posted a link to my post on their Facebook page. And, it keeps coming- this weekend I got an email from a couple of guys who are creating a more affordable CNC machine ( a Maker tool…) and someone sent them my piece and they want to talk too… who knows where it will all end!

So, moral of the story- do the right/nice thing when you can. Try something new. Keep trying- when I recently reread my earlier posts, I was not impressed, but I feel that with time and practice, I am finding my voice. Here’s to finding yours!

This past Saturday, approximately 2,000 visitors joined in a celebration of marine science at Hatfield Marine Science Center. There were opportunities to get behind-the-scenes tours, participate in activities in the wet labs, and interact with scientists, staff, and students from the OSU campus of Corvallis, HMSC Campus, Oregon Sea Grant, and Oregon Coast Aquarium. Some of the state and federal agencies in attendance were National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Research, NOAA Marine Operations, United States Fish and Wildlife, the Environmental Protection Agency, and Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. These groups shared their research and the tools they use to collect data. It was a great opportunity for the public to hear and see some of work that takes place in the lab and along the coast.

I made a point of observing the facilitators/researchers and listening for their personal methods of communicating science. For those presenting their work, they had to rapidly tailor their message to a diverse audience. Interacting with young children, their parents, and grandparents, how did they capture the interest of this multi-generational group? As each person brings with them a range of science knowledge, vocabulary, and attitudes towards science, how did the dialogue evolve between learner and facilitator? I also watched the dynamics between group members as they stopped at stations. If adults were with their children, what was the adult doing while the child interacted with the facilitator (whether it was a scientist, student researcher, etc.)? Did they get impatient if their child did not answer a question right away? Did they try to coax an answer out of them? Did the adults get so enthusiastic they dominated the interaction? Several questions came out of watching family groups make their way through the activities.

One station that was memorable for me was a simulation of a watershed and impacts to water quality. Staff members from the Environmental Protection Agency of Newport used a model using several familiar items. Two cake pans with sand were placed side-by-side. The sand was built up to represent a shoreline and small plants were placed in the thickest section of sand. The difference between the two was the presence of a wetland, indicated by pieces of sponge, near the shoreline. Using food coloring, pollution was added to the model, followed by a “rainstorm”, or a spray bottle filled with water. As the pollution moved over the surface, you could see where the wetland “sponge” soaked up the polluted water and prevented it from entering the water along shore. The staff showed how this was similar to surface runoff and the challenges of pollutants entering waters along the Oregon Coast. The facilitators summarized this simulation with an explanation of why wetlands are important and connected it to the simulation the visitors just witnessed. As I moved on to other exhibits, I wondered if the concept of a wetland and its purpose had changed for these particular individuals.

Having this many visitors on site on one day, I took some time to watch behavior around the touchtable. I looked for patterns to help refine my research questions of how people use an interactive tabletop in an informal science setting. This setup is different from “informational kiosks” used in many museums, having a size and orientation similar to a desktop computer screen. As the touchtable is a flat computer, the table setup itself may be attractive or inviting. I watched as a group of five people leaned in and had at least five hands on the table simultaneously. There were instances of users reading text out loud to others and modeling behavior of how to do a particular task on the screen. I also noticed whether users would put one hand or two on the table and if they started with one finger or more, and did this vary by age? I watched to see how soon someone was able to figure out what the point or goal of the software was and whether they refer to the instructions. A few users took some time to speak about their experience using the table. It was a helpful exercise and a reminder that there is still quite a bit to do before the summer season begins.

Marine Science Day was a great event due to the incredible work by many staff and volunteers that are connected to the HMSC community. Looking forward to next year!

Happy New Year! With regards to Susan’s post on the final day of 2013, I appreciated the chance to reflect on my experiences and accomplishments of the past 12 months. I have already learned so much from my peers, my courses, and through work in the Cyberlab. I am looking forward to 2014 as it will be full of hard work and additional opportunities to build personal and professional skills while I conduct research in the field of free choice learning.

One area I am excited to continue studying are strategies and methods of communicating scientific information to the public. At the Visitors Center we are always striving to improve our exhibit design, and our personal methods of interpretation while interacting with visitors. We critique what we say and how we say it whether it is on exhibit signage or in conversation. Effective communication, particularly the translation of technical information to a diverse audience, is a skill that takes practice. The challenge is communicating the information in a way that is inclusive and avoids confusing jargon. Other members of our lab have discussed the value and elements of science communication through the blog and I am seeing more of these conversations occurring within the scientific community online.

As scientists and researchers, we are attempting to answer questions and understand natural phenomena. Why would we want to keep that information to ourselves? Are scientists motivated to share their work beyond formal conferences and peer-reviewed journals? With regards to the previous question, there is evidence that indeed scientists want to share their work with a wider network. For example, more and more researchers are writing blogs and using social media channels to showcase their findings. I recently joined Twitter and following #scicomm has been a valuable resource for me as I learn about this topic. The discussion covers many areas — whether scientists should be trained in graduate school on effective communication strategies, to which channels are most effective (Twitter vs. Facebook), to making connections and advancing research. I am interested to follow how the the relationship between social media and science progresses. As future generations enter the field of research, how will the value or use of peer-reviewed journals and social media platforms evolve?

In future posts I will discuss social media and science, and other examples of how scientific content is shared in unique ways online. Of particularly interest to me are infographics, which represent complex data and information using graphic design techniques.

It is probably not a mystery to anyone who knows me, but I have a complicated relationship with the Make movement. Make is, in my opinion, an fascinating form of free choice learning. It grew out of the (computer) Hacker movement and has evolved to include all kinds of do it your self kind of projects- from building your own 3-D printer at home to keeping bees. If you have ever seen any old “Popular Mechanics” magazines, full of projects to do at home, you will have a sense of Make Magazine, which has been in publication since 2005. From this beginning, as well as a very interactive and content rich website, a whole community has sprouted up around the world, with local Maker Spaces for regular meet-ups as well as annual Maker Faire events that have the subtitle “the greatest Show and Tell on Earth”. What Make realized, from their start with the magazine and website, is that people wanted more than a “Do it Yourself” (DIY) lifestyle- they wanted to come together in community and share skills and tools and a communal space to work on larger and group projects- more of a “Do it with Others” (DIWO) style. Currently, there are hundreds of MakerSpaces around the world and more Maker Faire events happening in places from New York to Eugene to Tokyo.

In the last few years, they have also started reaching out more deliberately to youth, with the MakerEd initiative (yes, they do work the “Make” thing a bit too much, even for my taste!). Realizing that most young people do not have access to Make experiences or much in the way of hands on learning, they have taken this on, creating a system of mentor training, a summer Maker Camp offered through the Google Plus/Hangout platform with new projects every day for a month, as well as organizing Maker Faires to be family friendly events. I think it is one of the most exciting things happening in learning right now.

So, back to my opening comment- why is my relationship with Make a complicated one? Well, in all honesty, I am not really a Maker- I just don’t have much of a desire to get in there and build things or interact with computers any more than I have to, so I sometimes feel like a poser. I do knit and crochet, so can work the craft angle, and am getting more into the homestead lifestyle as I get older and my priorities shift around. But, I am a Make enthusiast! I have spoken about it, or presented posters at 4 conferences and counting and try to let people know about it whenever appropriate. A telling comment was at the AAPT conference this summer, when someone asked me what my relationship or role is with Make, and the first answer that came to me was, “well, I am a Make evangelist”. I do want to get the word out and get people excited and involved in helping create these experiences for learners of all ages.

Thus, while I might never pick up a soldering gun, you will find me helping build this community in as many ways as I can. Keep your eyes open- there is Making happening everywhere!

Peace, Jen

I have been coding my qualitative interview data all in one big fell swoop, trying to get everything done for the graduation deadline. It feels almost like a class project that I’ve put off, as usual, longer than I should have. In having a conversation with another grad student, about timelines, and how I’ve been sitting on this data since oh, November or so (at least a good chunk of it), we speculated about why we don’t tackle it in smaller chunks. One reason for me, I’m sure, is just general fear of failure or whatever drives my general procrastinating and perfectionist tendencies (remember, the best dissertation is a DONE dissertation – we’re not here to save the world with this one project).

However, another reason occurs to me as well; I collected all the data myself and I wonder if I was too close to it in the process of collecting it? I certainly had to prioritize finishing collecting it, considering the struggles I had to get subjects to participate, and delays with IRB, etc. But I wonder if it’s actually been better to leave it all for a while and come back to it. I guess if I had really done the interview coding before the eye-tracking, I might have shaped the eye-tracking interviews a bit differently, but I think the main adjustments I made based on the interviews were sufficient without coding (i.e. I recognized how much the experts were just seeing that the images were all the same and I couldn’t come up with difficult enough tasks for them, really). The other reason to have coded the interviews first would have been to separate my interviewees into high- and low-performing, if the data proved to be that way, so that I could invite sub-groups for the eye-tracking. But I ended up, again due to recruitment issues, just getting whoever I could from my interview population to come back. And now, I’m not really sure there’s any high- or low-performers among the novices anyway – they each seem to have their strengths and weaknesses at this task.

Other fun with coding: I have a mix of basically closed-ended questions that I am scoring with a rubric for correctness, and then open-ended “how do you know” semi-clinical interview questions. Since I eventually repeated some of these questions for the various versions of the scaffolded images, my subjects started to conflate their answers and parsing these things apart is truly a pleasure (NOT). And, I’m up to some 120 codes, and keeping those all in mind as I go is just nuts. Of course, I have just done the first pass, and as I created codes as I went through, I have to turn around and re-code for those particular ones on the ones I coded before I created them, but I still am stressing as to whether I’m finding everything in every transcript, especially the sort of obscure codes. I have one that I’ve dubbed “Santa” because two of my subjects referred to knowing the poles of Earth are cold because they learned that Santa lives at the North Pole where it’s cold. So I’m now wondering if there were any other evidences of non-science reasoning that I missed. I don’t think this is a huge problem; I am fairly confident my coding is thorough, but I’m also at that stage of crisis where I’m not sure any of this is good enough as I draw closer to my defense!

Other fun facts: I also find myself agonizing over what to call codes, when the description is more important. And it’s also a very humbling look at how badly I (feel like I) conducted the interviews. For one thing, I asked all the wrong questions, as it turns out – what I expected people would struggle with, they didn’t really, and I didn’t have good questions ready to probe for what they did struggle with. Sigh. I guess that’s for the next experiment.

The good stuff: I do have a lot of good data about people’s expectations of the images and the topics, especially when there are misunderstandings. This will be important as we design new products for outreach, both the images themselves and the supporting info that must go alongside. I also sorta thought I knew a lot about this data going into the coding, but number of new codes with each subject is surprising, and gratifying that maybe I did get some information out of this task after all. Finally, I’m learning that this is an exercise in throwing stuff out, too – I was overly ambitious in my proposal about all the questions I could answer, and I collected a lot more data than I can use at the moment. So, as is a typical part of the research process, I have to choose what fits the story I need to tell to get the dissertation (or paper, or presentation) done for the moment, and leave the rest aside for now. That’s what all those papers post-dissertation are for, I guess!

What are your adventures with/fears about coding or data analysis? (besides putting it off to the last minute, which I don’t recommend).

I’d like to introduce you to a type of Science Center visitor I call “Fish Stick Boyfriend.” Here’s a common demographic profile, based on my own experience:

-White

-Male

-30-35 years old

-Visiting with a female companion (and sometimes children)

The interaction generally follows a simple pattern. Fish Stick Boyfriend frowns and paces while his companion darts from exhibit to exhibit. I’m siphoning a tank, and she is too engaged with the surrounding interpretive content to notice I’m there. Fish Stick Boyfriend notices me, though. He wants to talk.

“So,” he says, pointing at an equally disinterested rockfish, “can you eat those? What do they taste like?”

He’s being sarcastic—at least that’s what he thinks he’s doing. Fortunately, I’ve seen many Fish Stick Boyfriends before, and I know what’s going on. I tell him what rockfish tastes like and where to get it. Then I tell him why it tastes the way it does, and how that relates to the animal’s life history. Then I show him an animal that tastes different, explain why, and tell him where he can go to buy it.

Fish Stick Boyfriend is now usually smiling and looking at some exhibits, and occasionally we actually start talking. His initial comment reveals some useful things:

1. He feels out of place

2. He’s familiar with fish as food

3. He wants to interact with somebody, but he chose an aquarist over a designated interpreter

On the exhibit floor, I’m “just a guy.” Visitors sometimes feel comfortable talking to me when they might avoid an interpretive volunteer or education staff member. Part of the reason may be that I’m usually facing the same direction they are—a small but significant proxemic distinction. I’m talking with them, rather than at them. I’m having a conversation, rather than giving a lecture. It’s not even much to do with what I say—the visitors’ perception makes all the difference.

When it comes to engaging the peripheral learners in a group, I’ve found that the most effective interpreters are often not interpreters at all. Fish Stick Boyfriend doesn’t think he likes Science Centers, but he’s comfortable talking to “the guy who cleans the tanks.” He sees me as a peripheral figure, too.

Over the past few years, I’ve developed a rough, conversational interpretive plan for just about every object in the Visitor Center. The octopus sculpture at the front desk can be used to talk about anatomy. Laura’s footprint decals can be used to talk about population genetics via variations in calcaneal pitch. Exhibits under construction can be used to talk about interpretation itself.

Whether you’re a trained interpreter or not, it’s important to recognize your relationship to the visitor experience. If you’re not perceived as a representative of the institution, you can use that as a position of power on behalf of the visitor. You’re “just a guy” or “just a girl,” changing a light fixture or measuring a table or feeding a frog or miming the destruction of an uncooperative video player. Some visitors may see you as the only approachable person in the building, and your response is crucial.

Fish Stick Boyfriend is bored, and only you can help him.

The Free-Choice Learning Laboratory at HMSC

Informal science education research

Tag Archives: outreach

HMSC Open House — Marine Science Day 2014

Sharing science through social media

Why make such a big deal about Make? (By Jen Wyld)

Monkey See, Monkey Don’t

Fish Stick Boyfriend

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