TY - JOUR
T1 - Embracing Research Mindset Among BSc Soil Science Students Through Research-Teaching Nexus
AU - Al-Ismaily, Said
AU - Kacimov, Anvar
AU - Al-Maktoumi, Ali
AU - Al-Busaidi, Hamad
PY - 2018/4/1
Y1 - 2018/4/1
N2 - Pedagogical experts in higher education emphasize towards strengthening
research-teaching symbiosis with the goal of preparation students to the
challenges of professional life. Soil students are in an inordinate and
vigorous position to play a significant role towards understanding and
dealing with the multifaceted/complex processes in soil as a critical
zone, in a complex interaction with other Earth's systems. Hence, soil
graduates should have generic and versatile research skills/technical
abilities for coping with the increasingly broad holistic role of soils
related to the function and sustainability of the Earth. We present, a
research-based pedagogy of a course, Soil & Water Tour, for final
year undergraduates in Soil Sciences, at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU).
The course pedagogy is designed to stimulate the undergraduates towards
effective research attributes by conducting their own experiments and by
providing opportunities for students to discover and to use the
fundamental laws/principles of soil sciences to solve real-world
problems. Students are expected to develop research metacognitive skills
enabling them to work collaboratively across disciplines. The course
consists of 5-days of fieldwork, during a winter break, followed by
designing and execution sets of soil column/pot experiments and
laboratory analyses, using SQU facilities during the Spring semester.
Students are required to submit a final report and orally defend the
results of their research work by the end of this semester. About 25-30
students register for the course and 5-6 students' groups (3-5
students/group with one student assigned as a leader) are formulated.
Each group is exposed to a well-demarcated research question or case
study formulated by the instructors who later mentor specific groups.
The research assignments are multidisciplinary and vary from finding a
specific well-protocolled solution to a concrete problem to a "wicked"
type of case study, with no apriori clue of methodology and expected
results. The topics of the research experiments are connected to
concepts/topics discussed during the fieldwork. Groups meet at the
beginning of the Spring semester and submit a proposal on the assigned
research task with the followings: research question(s), objectives,
experimental design, analyses and resources needed, and project
timeline. Students' outcomes performance within the desired research
attributes is assessed through: • Regular meetings with the
faculty mentoring the group; • Progress report and assessment by
the group leader; • Skills gained from the field and experiments;
and • Students' final report and presentation Teaching evaluations
in 2009-2016 showed the course to earn an average rating of 3.5/4.0
while the College average for all other courses (about 150/semester)
during the same period was 3.2. Majority of students highly evaluate the
course. For instance, a student wrote: "I am considering this course as
a quantum leap based on the quality and nature of the assigned projects,
the cooperative spirit between the students and faculty, and the type of
support/encouragement that the students receive". We discuss the
challenges in implementing the objectives of this course. The presented
pedagogy can be extended to other geosciences courses with
fieldwork-laboratory integration.
AB - Pedagogical experts in higher education emphasize towards strengthening
research-teaching symbiosis with the goal of preparation students to the
challenges of professional life. Soil students are in an inordinate and
vigorous position to play a significant role towards understanding and
dealing with the multifaceted/complex processes in soil as a critical
zone, in a complex interaction with other Earth's systems. Hence, soil
graduates should have generic and versatile research skills/technical
abilities for coping with the increasingly broad holistic role of soils
related to the function and sustainability of the Earth. We present, a
research-based pedagogy of a course, Soil & Water Tour, for final
year undergraduates in Soil Sciences, at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU).
The course pedagogy is designed to stimulate the undergraduates towards
effective research attributes by conducting their own experiments and by
providing opportunities for students to discover and to use the
fundamental laws/principles of soil sciences to solve real-world
problems. Students are expected to develop research metacognitive skills
enabling them to work collaboratively across disciplines. The course
consists of 5-days of fieldwork, during a winter break, followed by
designing and execution sets of soil column/pot experiments and
laboratory analyses, using SQU facilities during the Spring semester.
Students are required to submit a final report and orally defend the
results of their research work by the end of this semester. About 25-30
students register for the course and 5-6 students' groups (3-5
students/group with one student assigned as a leader) are formulated.
Each group is exposed to a well-demarcated research question or case
study formulated by the instructors who later mentor specific groups.
The research assignments are multidisciplinary and vary from finding a
specific well-protocolled solution to a concrete problem to a "wicked"
type of case study, with no apriori clue of methodology and expected
results. The topics of the research experiments are connected to
concepts/topics discussed during the fieldwork. Groups meet at the
beginning of the Spring semester and submit a proposal on the assigned
research task with the followings: research question(s), objectives,
experimental design, analyses and resources needed, and project
timeline. Students' outcomes performance within the desired research
attributes is assessed through: • Regular meetings with the
faculty mentoring the group; • Progress report and assessment by
the group leader; • Skills gained from the field and experiments;
and • Students' final report and presentation Teaching evaluations
in 2009-2016 showed the course to earn an average rating of 3.5/4.0
while the College average for all other courses (about 150/semester)
during the same period was 3.2. Majority of students highly evaluate the
course. For instance, a student wrote: "I am considering this course as
a quantum leap based on the quality and nature of the assigned projects,
the cooperative spirit between the students and faculty, and the type of
support/encouragement that the students receive". We discuss the
challenges in implementing the objectives of this course. The presented
pedagogy can be extended to other geosciences courses with
fieldwork-laboratory integration.
M3 - Article
VL - 20
SP - 1490
JO - 20th EGU General Assembly, EGU2018, Proceedings from the conference held 4-13 April, 2018 in Vienna, Austria
JF - 20th EGU General Assembly, EGU2018, Proceedings from the conference held 4-13 April, 2018 in Vienna, Austria
ER -