Earth Data, Science Writing, and Peer Review in a Large General Education Oceanography Class

Writing assignments were introduced to a large introductory Oceanography class at UCSB. The assignments evolved, over a period of 10 years, from papers handed in to the instructor, to online peer reviewed assignments using the calibrated peer review methodology. The assignments required students to...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of geoscience education 2008-01, Vol.56 (1), p.61-72
Main Authors: Prothero, William A., Kelly, Gregory J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Captions
College Students
Computer Software
Critical thinking
Education
Educational Technology
First Aid
General Education
Grading
Homework
Introductory Courses
Learning
Majors (Students)
Management Systems
Methods
Network storage
Oceanography
Peer review
Plate Tectonics
Research methodology
Science Curriculum
Skills
Software
Students
Teaching assistants
Teaching Methods
Thinking Skills
Writing Assignments
Writing Exercises
Writing Instruction
Written Language
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Description
Summary:Writing assignments were introduced to a large introductory Oceanography class at UCSB. The assignments evolved, over a period of 10 years, from papers handed in to the instructor, to online peer reviewed assignments using the calibrated peer review methodology. The assignments required students to acquire and plot data and use these data plots to create scientific arguments in support of a theory. The topics addressed plate tectonics, the Indian monsoon, the Earth's climate, and the world fisheries. The course activities were managed by the EarthEd software package, which supports course management functions such as online writing and peer review, image storage and upload, auto-graded homework problems, and course grade computation. Access to Earth data is integrated within the EarthEd software through the "Our Dynamic Planet" CDROM, Global Ocean Data Viewer, and links to other data browsers available on the web. Data representations are captured as images, uploaded to the student's image library (in EarthEd) and then can be edited and linked to the writing assignment text. Convenient commenting, scoring, grade curving, and posting is also implemented. The peer review assignments were successful in providing accurate grades for students, while reducing grading by the instructor by about 70% to 80%.
ISSN:1089-9995
2158-1428
DOI:10.5408/1089-9995-56.1.61