ENGAGING STUDENTS UNDERSTANDING EARTH IN THE CONTEXT OF SOCIETAL ISSUES THROUGH THE INTEGRATE TEACHING MATERIALS

Teaching materials designed through InTeGrate, NSF’s STEP Center in the Geosciences, aim to dramatically increase students’ Earth literacy and preparation to tackle environmental and resource issues by integrating teaching about Earth in the context of societal issues throughout the undergraduate curriculum. This poster demonstrates how these materials support the ability to teach Earth literacy in both disciplinary and interdisciplinary courses, and showcases how educators can optimize the materials’ built-in tools and design features.

The design process ensured that materials utilize the Earth science and other geoscience literacy principles through the use of the InTeGrate Materials Development Rubric and a rigorous review. Designed by interdisciplinary and inter-institutional author teams, materials are flexible for adaptation and adoption in a variety of classroom environments across institution types and disciplines. The ready-to-use materials can be used as is or mixed and matched to create customized curricula. Instructor surveys show that, to date, materials have reached more than 100,000 students in undergraduate courses, K-12 classes, and beyond.

The materials make use of active learning strategies to: 1) address grand challenge(s) involving Earth and society, 2) develop students’ ability to address interdisciplinary issues, 3) improve students’ geoscientific thinking, 4) use authentic and credible data, and 5) incorporate systems thinking. Topics include climate change, food security, water availability, natural resources, natural hazards, environmental justice, and more. Units include stand-alone activities and provide all materials required to complete and assess each activity. Instructor stories provide first-hand accounts for how faculty implemented materials.

To maximize usability, materials include a summary and goals for each module and activity, the duration and grade level the materials are written for, suggestions for ‘best fit’ courses, alignment with the Earth/Ocean/Climate/Atmosphere literacies and the NGSS, a PDF or zip file for integration into an LMS, a stand-alone version of student materials, inclusion of private instructor-only access to answer keys, and more. Explore the materials: https://serc.carleton.edu/integrate/teaching_materials