conferences « The Free-Choice Learning Laboratory at HMSC

Last month I attended ASTC (Association of Science and Technology Centers), which was a great opportunity to hear about work in other science centers, visit a new museum, and meet some of the researchers that I often cite in my work! This year the conference was held in Raleigh, North Carolina — a new state to visit! Oregon State University had great representation as two of my colleagues, Laia and Jenny, presented their analysis of science communication in natural history museum exhibits. Dr. John Falk and Dr. Lynn Dierking presenting in research and evaluation sessions.

Dr. Hayat Sindi started off the conference with an inspirational keynote speech. Born in Saudi Arabia, she followed her interests in science to become the first female from the Gulf to earn a PhD in biotechnology. She is a co-founder of Diagnostics for All which designs and creates medical diagnostic tools that can be used in areas that may not have the medical infrastructure. She spoke of science heroes and how we continue to look to the past, which is dominated by white males. She challenged us to continue to work and inspire young people to look for the heroes of today, many that are female, who are doing powerful things to advance our knowledge in the science field.

One of the more memorable sessions I attended focused on the premise of designing flow experiences and balancing sensory stimulation in the physical spaces of science centers. As I am still learning about the design of the physical space, at times it seems that science centers and museums try to put so much into a room without considering how overwhelming it could be for the visitor. With the advancement of technology and digital media interactives, this is creating more stimulation as the visitor tries to navigate and determine where to focus their attention. Beth Redmond-Jones of the San Diego Natural History Museum spoke about her daughter who has autism. She showed an interview of her daughter describing what an experience at a museum space is like for her. For a few minutes the audience had the opportunity to “feel” what it is like to have the sensory overload. The fluorescent lights of the room were put to the highest level, we had to move in our seats to that we were very close to our neighbors, and they played a recording from a museum lobby that had competing noises of conversations, babies crying, and sounds from exhibits. This immersion technique was effective to prove a point to the audience. From this there was discussion on how to make the space more inclusive for those with differences in sensory reception, incorporating spaces that are quiet, and training staff how to effectively engage with these visitors.

As a first time attendee to this conference, I was trying to soak it all in…the Exhibition Hall, the networking, the city surrounding the conference, and a cool museum — the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. They have some amazing exhibits that incorporate technology. There was a microbiology lab that allows for formal or informal exploration of DNA which I would have loved when I was in middle school. The museum also made use of several touch screens in different sizes to present science content. It was interesting to see their showcase of technology alongside their traditional dioramas and natural history exhibits. So much potential for learning research with technology as well! I could have spent several more days in Raleigh, but since I am in the midst of Fall Quarter with a busy course load, I’ll just have to make plans to visit again someday. Check out #ASTC2014 to see tweets about the conference.

I am writing this blog right now from a lounging area at the Ottawa Convention Center, where a group of us (Laura Good, Michelle Mileham, Jen Wyld, Shawn Rowe and myself) are participating at the North American Association for Environmental Education – NAAEE 2014 Conference. This morning, we tag teamed in the presentation of a workshop to help a diverse array of environmental educators to think about EE and STEM integration at their institutions, what STEM means to them and what would be some STEM integration goals in their workplaces. One of our activities included a “thought swap” exercise with prompted questions to draw on people’s perceptions and understanding about STEM.

As an exercise for ourselves as presenters, we decided to also answer the questions so that we knew where everyone of us was coming from as we all represent different backgrounds and perspectives. It was a good reflective exercise that drew me back to my past and really made me think about identity building within STEM fields. So, I thought I should share my thoughts in this blog and invite you to comment and respond as a further reflective exercise. What is a STEM activity to you? If you have the opportunity, how do you engage learners in STEM activities? Where do you want to see STEM in the future?

NAAEE 2014 - Sharing STEM definitions — NAAEE 2014 – Sharing STEM definitions

NAAEE 2014 - thinking and talking about STEM and STEM goals — NAAEE 2014 – thinking and talking about STEM and STEM goals

When I was prompted to think about STEM opportunities during my childhood, the first thing that came to mind were my years growing up with the ocean as my backyard. Not having much money, my playtime and built experiences involved a lot of exploration, observation and use of creative tools for play at a natural environment, the ocean. A lot of inquiry, a lot of repurposing, and engineering went on while me and my brothers tried to build floating devices from found natural objects, or just simply got curious about understanding why and how the sea cucumber squirted when handled by us. Those years were full with STEM opportunities, sometimes taken and sometimes ignored, but they consist of the basis of my critical thinking about the state of our oceans and what its challenges represent to me, as well as my career choices.

Past jobs I had almost always involved some sort of science-based activity involving live animal interactions. The insect zoo programs I did while working at Iowa State University are a great example of it, where there was a lot of science inquiry through hands-on, minds-on activities and tasks that related the science concepts in programing with the audience’s daily lives and activities, addressing misconceptions in practical and fun ways. (i.e. Why are people scared of bugs, why do people think hissing cockroaches are big and nasty? Well …lets look at them closely and think about what we know, discuss with ours peers and figure out why we think that).

Perhaps at that point, I did not have a full understanding of STEM, but that was nevertheless part of my work routine. Today, STEM fields are defined and specialized fields receiving much attention in modern society as an important literacy component, especially when we want to address modern world issues. They become important because, although generally seen as complex fields, they are nevertheless part of daily life and routine activities for people. There are many opportunities for STEM thinking from the time one wakes up to the time ones goes to bed. From thinking to actual activity, STEM occurs when those real world applications are materialized in a STEM goal, which one works toward with real specialized tools to further develop understanding.

With that in mind, an important goal I see for this new and ongoing discussion of what STEM is and how we do and promote STEM, is not only the development of the field in its needed scenarios, but also the recognition of the very social aspect of incorporating this new field of “STEM” as a symbolic and cultural tool that societies appropriate. Engaging in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math should go along with clearly understanding why, how and for whom to engage in a particular STEM practice, as a way to truly assign meaning to the activity beyond doing STEM for the sake of STEM.

Welcoming sun, great food, and warm people came to greet us upon our arrival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. For me, it is always so good to be home, and this time home at the “wonderful City” to learn about the advancements in science communication taking place in Brazil and Latin America in general. Make no assumptions, this was not a “have fun in the sun” trip, although I would have liked to have spent some time at a tropical beach where swimming is the main activity. Instead, as hard workers and, let’s be honest, good museum nerds, we got to visit Museums and work on strategic evaluation and research planning around some exhibits.

Our first activity involved a whole day visit to the “Museu Ciencia e Vida” (Museum of Science and life) to see and discuss an exhibit called “Forest of Senses”. Luisa Massarani, a former Cyberscholar and Director of Red-Pop UNESCO (Network for the popularization of science and technology in Latin America and the Carebean) is a part of the team in charge of evaluation and research on children’s experience in the exhibit. After a 4 hour meeting, we discussed and finalized the whole research plan and stages of analyses. It felt very rewarding to be recognized as researchers with valuable expertise and to contribute to cutting edge learning research in the Brazilian landscape. Forest of Senses is a great exhibit designed to work as a game activity for younger kids (5-8 years of age) to explore the Brazilian forest habitats and, through using their senses, be provoked and able to explore the ideas around biodiversity, invasive species and wildlife traffic (which is a big problem in Brazil). When we walked through the exhibit to see the initial camera installation and testing through the system package we arranged for them to become a “node” of Cyberlab, it was like reliving the past when Cyberlab started, amidst tons of duck tape and creative solutions for IT problems. As we move forward in this collaboration, it will be interesting to share the process, findings and cultural clashes in the use of cutting edge technology.

To finalize this part I in the summary of our trip, we spent our last 2 days in Rio participating at the RedPop Event organized by Luisa Massarani, with the goal to discuss the science communication scenario in Latin America, where Brazil holds 260 of the total 490 science museums established. It was a great event, I even got to be interviewed by a science journalist for the first time (way to practice my communicating skills). It seems to me Latin America has come long ways not only in the effort of establishing science museums but in the reflection on evaluation and research practices to attend the cultural use of these places. From this event, we came out with fresh ideas on methods for learning research, with many bridges to collaboration in interdisciplinary projects including touch-tank research in Brazilian aquariums, and with a amazing contact list with the names of great science communication researchers throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. It was also very professionally rewarding to receive recognition for the cutting edge work being developed at Cyberlab and seeing its potential to really materialize and spread. Stay tune for more!

IMG_20140914_130320_257 RedPop2014_3

RedPop2014 RedPop2014_2

“Hands-On Science Museums and Their Visitors” is the topic of a two-day conference coming up September in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Cyberlab will represent Hatfield Science Center/Oregon State University and will join other Science communication professionals from Argentina, Brasil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, United States, Mexico and the United Kingdom to engage in dialogue about visitor meaning making, basically the kind of conversation we are very enthusiastic about engaging in and promoting, especially in such a multicultural setting.

Luisa Massarani, who was a Cyberscholar this Summer and who is the Director of the RedPop, the Network for Science Communication for Latin America and the Caribbean, organized this event to discuss strategies Museums around the world employ not only to investigate learning but also how a diverse public construct meaning from their visits. Although a bit intimidated I will admit, I am supper excited to participate in this event because it strikes me as a place where paradigmatic shifts in learning research are possible and in fact welcome, as a place where we can make room to discuss strategies to capture and analyze meaning making, to look at visitors from their perspectives, to go beyond the traditional measures of learning outcomes in research, to really give our visitors a voice we can dialogue with in the academic written world.

We talk about this need for a new culture of learning in our Free-Choice Lab meetings, Luisa talked about that in her seminar presentation as a Cyberscholar and the need to understand “provocation” and build provocative exhibits. Shawn and I talked about this in an article just published in the NAI Magazine “Legacy”, which led us to an invitation to expand this thinking through a series of articles for the InterpNews Magazine next year. As these kinds of dialogues spread and increase (as it seems to be happening in my opinion), this discussion becomes highly related to current dialogues on learning research methods and applications in the world of practice. I have been recently involved with the new “Methods” Research Interest Group of NARST (National Association for Research in Science Teaching) and the current development of a broad scope dialogue on learning research that seems to be heading in the direction of valuing these paradigmatic discussions and the need to change.

Even though we are all trying to do this kind of more inclusive, learner-based research in our work, we need to see ourselves as important voices in the larger network of discussions, and commit to speak our mind in fruitful and inclusive ways. Meetings like this really allow us to reflect on how we are trying to do that in the context not just of our own lab and cohort here, but in the larger international context as well. It also gives us a chance to make things real, to move from discussion to actual application invigorated by the good work of others and motivated by our own growth and learning as professionals in the field.

To learn more about RedPop visit the following pages:

http://www.redpop.org/redpopasp/paginas/InfoPrensaDetalle.asp?SitioID=1&InfoPrensaId=90

http://www.redpop.org/redpopasp/paginas/pagina.asp?PaginaID=3

Last week I traveled to Annapolis to present on research taking place in the Cyberlab at the National Marine Educators Association’s annual conference. It was a great opportunity to meet and network with other professionals and educators that focus on the marine and aquatic environment. Attendees come from both the formal and informal education field, but also staff members of state, federal, and non-profit environmental organizations. The schedule was filled with workshops, informative sessions, local tourist activities, and social events. Highlights of the trip included a visit to the National Aquarium in Baltimore, as well as a chance to learn about oysters while sailing on a skipjack boat on the Chesapeake Bay. I also had a chance to walk around downtown Annapolis and see some of the historic buildings that were present at the time our country was established.

I presented early in the conference and I was pleased with the attendance to my session. Several people spoke to me afterwards and expressed their interested in human learning in an aquarium setting and what that means for the visitor experience. There was also a strong interest in the types of technology we were using to study behaviors and learning, as well as the touch-surface exhibits we have installed as part of the NSF grant. As we are still in the process of recruiting Cyber Scholars, I hope that future collaborations come from the interest expressed at the conference.

A recurring theme during the week was the current state of the ocean and climate change. I attended the National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation (NNOCCI) introductory workshop prior to hear about the strategies they recommend when engaging the public at science centers and informal institutions on the topic of climate change. There was a great basic introduction to climate change, ocean acidification, and other environmental impacts of a changing climate. As one of the partners of this program is the Frameworks Institute, which has done research on the public perceptions of climate change, there was a focus on framing and considerations for conversational tone while interacting with visitors. We also had discussions on the incorporation of cultural ideals and values when presenting and interpreting a complex science topic. Throughout the day, we had several group discussions and brainstormed community based solutions to a global issue. As educators, it is now time to have the confidence to share our knowledge of how the planet is changing, and facilitate that spark of awareness with those we engage with.

The Keynote Presenter was Dr. Edith Widder, Deep-Sea Explorer and Conservationist, and CEO, Sr. Scientist and Co-Founder of the Ocean Research & Conservation Association. As an expert in bioluminescence and methods of deep sea exploration, she shared inspiring words with regards to the continued exploration of our ocean. There is so much that we do not know about our own planet and our marine environment, she encouraged us to keep working hard at educating others and keeping youth engaged in the marine sciences. Dr. Widder also shared some incredible footage of giant squid that live in the deep. These creatures were captured on tape, being attracted to powerful lights that acted as a “bait” symbolizing the same bioluminescent patterns that their prey express. Her talk made me want my own submersible to explore the deep!

I really appreciated the opportunity to attend this conference on behalf of the Cyberlab and interact with enthusiastic and determined educators. There are so many that are passionate about the ocean and excited to engage others in learning about the aquatic environment. Next year the annual conference is in the “other” Newport…Rhode Island. I hope to make it to this conference and share the results from my Master’s research in the Cyberlab, which will begin this week!

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