Susanne Pelger

A pessimistic estimate of the time required for an eye to evolve.

Theoretical considerations of eye design allow us to find routes along which the optical structures of eyes may have evolved. If selection constantly favours an increase in the amount of detectable spatial information, a light-sensitive patch will gradually turn into a focused lens eye through continuous small improvements of design. An upper limit for the number of generations required for the complete transformation can be calculated with a minimum of assumptions. Even with a consistently pessimistic approach the time required becomes amazingly short: only a few hundred thousand years.

Rhetorical Meta-language to Promote the Development of Students’ Writing Skills and Subject Matter Understanding

Background: Feedback is one of the most significant factors for students’ development of writing skills. For feedback to be successful, however, students and teachers need a common language – a meta-language – for discussing texts. Not least because in science education such a meta-language might contribute to improve writing training and feedback-giving. Purpose: The aim of this study was to explore students’ perception of teachers’ feedback given on their texts in two genres, and to suggest how writing training and feedback-giving could become more efficient. Sample: In this study were included 44 degree project students in biology and molecular biology, and 21 supervising teachers at a Swedish university. Design and methods: The study concerned students’ writing about their degree projects in two genres: scientific writing and popular science writing. The data consisted of documented teacher feedback on the students’ popular science texts. It also included students’ and teachers’ answers to questionnaires about writing and feedback. All data were collected during the spring of 2012. Teachers’ feedback, actual and recalled – by students and teachers, respectively – was analysed and compared using the so-called Canons of rhetoric. Results: While the teachers recalled the given feedback as mainly positive, most students recalled only negative feedback. According to the teachers, suggested improvements concerned firstly the content, and secondly the structure of the text. In contrast, the students mentioned language style first, followed by content. Conclusions: The disagreement between students and teachers regarding how and what feedback was given on the students texts confirm the need of improved strategies for writing training and feedback-giving in science education. We suggest that the rhetorical meta-language might play a crucial role in overcoming the difficulties observed in this study. We also discuss how training of writing skills may contribute to students’ understanding of their subject matter.

Popular Science Writing Bringing New Perspectives into Science Students' Theses.

ABSTRACT This study analyses which perspectives occur in science students’ texts at different points in time during the process of writing a popular science article. The intention is, thus, to explore how popular science writing can help students discover and discuss different perspectives on science matter. For this purpose, texts written by 12 bachelor students in biology were analysed in a case study. For each of the students, four texts were studied using content analysis: two versions of a popular science article on the students bachelor project, and two texts reflecting on why the project is interesting. Throughout the writing process an increased number of perspectives was observed; the character of the perspectives also changed, from a narrow research perspective to a wider societal perspective. For example, environmental, medical, economical or ethical perspectives were added during the writing process. There was also a change concerning the level on which science matter was discussed, from specific to more general. A second aim was to explore how popular science writing may facilitate students’ scientific writing. In this part of the study, content analysis was conducted on 23 students’ written reflections. A vast majority described how the popular writing facilitated, in particular, the choice of content and perspectives also in their scientific writing. Altogether, the study concludes that popular science writing offers a cognitive tool to widen science students’ perspectives, and hence, to promote their development of scientific literacy and achievement of scientific writing skills.

Advancement towards the scholarship of teaching and learning through the writing of teaching portfolios

ABSTRACT This study explores the impact academic teachers’ writing of a teaching portfolio can have on their professional learning. Through an open-ended questionnaire, 26 academics from three faculties reported on insights, effects on teaching practice, and effects on collegial exchange that the portfolio writing entailed. We discuss how the experienced impact relates to the three competence levels excellence, expertise and scholarship of teaching and learning. With regard to academic development, we conclude that the writing of reflective teaching portfolios has the potential of contributing to an emerging academic community of practice characterised by a scholarly approach to teaching and learning.

Kompetensportfölj för dokumentation, reflektion och progression

Vad ar en kompetensportfolj? En samling arbetsprover som visar upp den egna kompetensen? En elektronisk plattform for dokumentlagring? En ovning i reflektion och utveckling? I denna rapport samlas erfarenheter fran medarbetare vid Lunds universitet som under perioden 2015–2016 har arbetat med kompetensportfoljer – for studenter och larare. Rapporten redovisar resultat fran tre delprojekt: • Utveckling av ett elektroniskt portfoljverktyg. • Utveckling, implementering och utvardering av reflektionsuppgifter i tre amnesmiljoer. • Analys av larares upplevelser av att skriva pedagogisk portfolj. Att dokumentera och reflektera over sin utveckling eller sitt larande leder till fordjupade kunskaper och nya insikter, det vittnar bade studenter och larare i studien om. En annan upplevelse som delas av bada grupperna ar att reflektion over den egna praktiken eller det egna larandet far positiva konsekvenser for forhallningssattet till larande. Den som blir medveten om sin egen utveckling far helt enkelt lust att fortsatta utvecklas.Studien visar hur reflektionsuppgifter kan anvandas i utbildningen for att forma studenter att satta upp mal och identifiera behov av kunskap. Darigenom kan reflektionsuppgifter skapa motivation for fortsatt larande. Reflektionsuppgifter utvecklar ocksa studenternas formaga att reflektera over sitt larande. Studenter som forstar sin larandeprocess visar en vilja att fortsatta utmana sig sjalva och forsatta sig i larorika situationer. Slutsatsen blir att studenten genom att reflektera formar sitt framtida larande, men att lararen maste lara studenten att reflektera.For studenter kan en kompetensportfolj ocksa kasta ljus over det som normalt inte syns i kursbetygen, men som har stor betydelse i arbetslivet, namligen generella kompetenser. Den redogor for insikter och erfarenheter som studenten utvecklat under sin utbildning och kan synliggora samarbetsformaga, kommunikativ kompetens och social kompetens i allmanhet. Aven larare framhaller vardet av att dokumentera och reflektera over sin utveckling. De vittnar om hur arbetet med en pedagogisk portfolj hjalper dem att ga fran intuition till vetenskapligt grundad pedagogik, ett mera systematiskt tillvagagangssatt i undervisningen och en vilja att utvecklas vidare i sin pedagogiska praktik.Sist men inte minst vill vi lyfta fram den tillfredsstallelse som arbetet med en kompetensportfolj skanker. Larare upplever hur reflektionen over den egna praktiken ger en okad trygghet i lararrollen. Studenter som reflekterar over sin utveckling och kompetens kanner sjalvfortroendet vaxa. Arbetet med en kompetensportfolj kan saledes vara utvecklande, pa ett bade intellektuellt och personligt plan. Men att dokumentera och reflektera ar en fardighet. Utan styrning riskerar reflektionerna att bli generella upprepningar av kursmal eller platta beskrivningar av handelseforlopp. Skribenter, i synnerhet studenter, behover instruktioner, ovning, goda exempel och respons for att utveckla sin formaga att dokumentera och reflektera. Rad och rekommendationer for arbetet med kompetensportfoljer finner du sist i rapporten. (Less)

Observed Learning Outcomes of Integrated Communication Training in Science Education: Skills and Subject Matter Understanding.

ABSTRACT In this paper we explore how different ways of training communication skills can be successfully implemented in higher education, and which effects these activities may have on science students’ learning. Using content analysis, we studied a material consisting of 34 reports, written by 70 academic science teachers, as part of a teacher-training course on communication in science higher education. In the course, the teachers developed and implemented communication tasks into their content courses, and analysed and reported on the observed learning outcomes. The tasks covered both written and oral communication addressing different audiences, inside as well as outside of academia. We found that integrating different ways of communication training in science courses entailed improved skills in sharing and discussing science information, and in addition, increased subject understanding. Thus, we conclude that the integration of communication training may effectively support students’ science learning in higher education.