Friday, September 30, 2016

Guest Blogger: Problem Solving Approaches in Agriscience Education

Editor's Note: This blog is part of a series of guest contributors from the National school-based agricultural education family. Mr. Craig Kohn is a current doctoral student in curriculum, instruction and teacher education at Michigan State University. He is a former instructor at Waterford Union High School outside of Milwaukee, WI. He is heavily involved with state and national agricultural education initiatives, including the new AFNR standards, the National SAE Renewal Taskforce, and is on a focus advisory group for the National FFA. Prior to becoming an agriscience instructor, Mr. Kohn conducted research in fields of medicine, ecology, and education at the University of Wisconsin - Madison, where he earned degrees and licenses in agriscience, education, agricultural education, and biology education. Mr. Kohn also has a license to teach environmental science. Mr. Kohn was raised on a dairy farm in northeastern Wisconsin near Green Bay, where he raised dairy, beef, swine, horses, goats, and chickens and was actively involved in environmental and ecological experiences on his home farm.

When I was in the 7th grade, we were asked to deliver an introductory speech about ourselves for an English class assignment. My best friend Paul introduced himself as someone who was very fluent in English, which he claimed proved that he was very smart because he had been told that English is a very difficult language to learn. While Paul was really just trying to be funny, his remark was actually pretty insightful. English is a notoriously-difficult language. Most native English speakers don’t even question the fact that the words “thought”, “through”, “though”, and “tough” each look similar but sound completely different, nor question the absurd reality that the words “bologna” and “pony” somehow rhyme.

Even though other Western languages like French or Spanish tend to be easier to learn than English, most native English speakers find it far more difficult to learn a second language. I personally took French in high school for two years. While most of my English was learned without a teacher licensed in the subject, most of my French was learned with a trained and highly-experienced professional for about an hour a day over the better part of two years. Today I can barely get beyond “Bonjour!” and would certainly not be prepared to visit a French-speaking region. However, were I to spend even just a week in Paris, I would probably be more fluent in speaking French than I was after two years in a French language classroom in the US.

The differences between the ease of learning our native language and the difficulty of learning a second language can be attributed to many factors, but one of the most important to consider is the difference between acquisition and learning.

Acquisition, Learning, and Literacy
James Paul Gee, in his 1991 work, “Rewriting Literacy”, made a clear distinction between acquisition and learning. Gee defined acquisition as the process of gaining skill or knowledge subconsciously through exposure as well as trial and error. According to Gee, this is very different from learning, which is an intentional process of gaining conscious knowledge or skill from a teacher. We unconsciously acquire our first language in a manner that seems almost effortless, but we almost always have to struggle to learn a second language (unless you were fortunate enough to grow up in a multilingual household).

Gee makes the case that much of our knowledge and skill comes through a combination of unstructured acquisition and intentional conscious learning. Driver’s education is a classic example of this. In most driver’s education programs, you begin in a classroom where you learn the fundamentals such as where to place your hands on the steering wheel, how to read road signs, and how to parallel park. We all know quite well that this intentional conscious learning is far from enough to fully prepare a student for the realities of driving a car, which is why the vast majority of students will also take part in numerous hours of behind the wheel with an instructor and a parent before getting their official license at age 16. If teenagers could just take a multiple choice test to get their license without the actual driving experience, our roads would be much more terrifying.

Agriscience education is no different than language, driver’s education, or any set of knowledge and skill that is to be gained by a student. If anything, agriscience courses are even more dependent on the combination of these two forms of education because much of agriculture depends on both knowledge and skill. Whether it be performing sutures to close a wound, using a microscope to identify a pathogen, collecting soil samples for testing, or delivering a marketing presentation, students in agricultural courses can only be fully prepared for careers and their personal futures if they can gain knowledge through both acquisition and learning. In fact, if you consider the three-circle model of agricultural education (classroom and laboratory learning, personal preparation, and career experiences), two of these three circles are more about gaining education through acquisition than from learning.

James Paul Gee would probably be very happy about this, as he argues that we tend to be more proficient in regards to knowledge and skill sets when they are gained through acquisition instead of learning. However, learning in a classroom setting results in more conscious awareness of the knowledge and skill that have been gained, making what occurs in the classroom and laboratory setting just as important as what occurs in immersive career experiences and personal growth opportunities. Nonetheless, a student’s classroom experiences can be enhanced by combining a mixture of learning and acquisition through strategies such as the problem-solving approach to teaching.

The Problem Solving Approach
The Problem Solving Approach is a method of instruction with origins going back to the work of John Dewey. If you are unfamiliar with John Dewey, you should get pretty familiar with him if you intend to work in the field of education because his work and philosophy serves for much of the basis of modern education. The problem solving approach tends to consist of four major themes:
  1. Engagement: the lesson or curriculum reflects a real-world consideration that is recognizable in the lives of students. 
  2. Inquiry: students must use curiosity, exploration, observation, and hypothesis formation to create answers for questions that may or may not have a right answer (or may have multiple right answers). 
  3. Solution building: the teacher in these lessons acts as a coach, enabling students to work in teams to make accurate observations, identify patterns, and develop rational models to explain an unknown phenomenon (this, by the way, is the basis for much of the practices that serve as a major component of the Next Generation Science Standards). 
  4. Reflection: once students have addressed an unknown situation in a manner that results in a plausible explanation based on evidence, logic, and critical thinking, the teacher again acts as a coach to elicit their reasoning, challenge their assumptions, and refine their analysis in a manner that both allows students to recognize gaps in their logic and breaks in their comprehension of core concepts in the material.
It should be noted that all of these components reflect a student-centered model of education. Traditionally, we think of the teacher as a repository of facts and information, a person who identifies when a student is wrong and re-directs them to the “correct knowledge”. Look at any multiple choice exam or teacher’s edition of a textbook and you could easily be forgiven for thinking that this is how education is supposed to work. I assure you, there are certainly more effective ways to be an instructor.

While there are many reasons to teach in a student-centered manner, among the most notable is that almost all students only have teachers in their daily lives for about 12-17 years. Individuals who were taught in a teacher-centered model are pretty much screwed for the rest of their lives because they consistently relied on an ‘expert’ to tell them what was right or wrong. This would be just fine if you could learn all of the facts in the world by the time you were 18 (and assume that no other facts would be discovered), but the fact of the matter is that you continue to be exposed to new information and ideas throughout your entire life! Good teachers therefore make themselves increasingly unnecessary by teaching their students how to make observations, propose questions, develop hypotheses, analyze evidence and arguments, and determine the validity of a conclusion. Good teachers enable their students to constantly ask themselves how they know they are not wrong even after they graduate. By utilizing a student-centered model of education, you can enable a student to make sense of the world even as new information and discoveries occur in their lives.

Furthermore, the problem solving approach enables a deeper comprehension of knowledge and a greater development of skill because it tends to entail a combination of acquisition and learning. Not only do students develop a conscious awareness of the knowledge and skills they have gained through their education but they have a better command of that knowledge and skill because it was developed in a manner reflective of real-world situations. If students can further immerse themselves in a career-based experience through FFA, an SAE, and other similar opportunities, they will enter the workforce with career-ready levels of knowledge and skill.

Student-Centered, Problem Solving Approaches in the Classroom
Without knowing any particular terms for these ideas, I began my career as a high school agriscience teacher with similar intentions. I had realized that there were stark differences between the education I had gained through acquisition on the Wisconsin dairy farm on which I had been raised and in the classrooms in which my old-school teacher-centered education had occurred. When I was experiencing a real-world environment through my acquisition-based education on the farm, I was unconsciously gaining expertise in a set of career and life skills that would remain with me for the rest of my life. However, I was not experiencing the same level of benefits in my high school classrooms. When I became a teacher myself, I yearned for my students to have the experiences that I had once had on our farm. In my opinion, the perfect classroom was an environment where the lessons could be not just learned but experienced as well.

As a new teacher, I worked tirelessly to create the types of environments where students could gain knowledge and skill through both learning and acquisition. I built pens, cages, and coops and filled them with cattle, chickens, ducks, rabbits, and a persnickety classroom cat named Tiffany. I regularly utilized our school forest and greenhouse, developed landscaping gardens, and created a working department office that was run by students. Using corporate donations, salvaged lab equipment, and as many grants as I could apply for, I renovated a spare room into a functional, modern scientific laboratory and made a point to use it at least once a week for any applicable class. As much as possible, I tried to force the real world through the doors of my classroom and into the lives of my students.

However, facilities alone do not make a student-centered, problem-solving, inquiry-based curriculum. To do this, I set up a curricular model that I taught in four phases:
  • Awareness – high school students need some kind of knowledge base before they can fruitfully engage in inquiry (because if you don’t know what you don’t know, you can’t be expected to do much inquiring). After an introductory activity in which I probed for their prior understanding (and misunderstanding), I provided students with a specific set of notes and guided worksheets to develop their knowledge base so that they could determine what questions to ask. 
  • Interaction – once students reasonably had the knowledge they needed to ask good questions, I provided them with problem-solving opportunities in which they could formatively assess their understanding of this knowledge and apply it in a real world scenario. This wasn’t a cookie-cutter lab where they blindly followed steps as if they were baking a recipe. These were truly inquiry-based experiences in which students had to make predictions, propose a rationale for their hypothesis, collect data, and explain the patterns in their data using models learned from classroom material. 
  • Mastery – in the interaction phase, students were guided and coached by their teacher to reach a point in which they could reflect and come to a logical conclusion. The mastery phase was the time for me as the instructor to ‘fade out’ and see if these students could achieve similar results in a less scaffolded and less structured setting. This typically served as part of their summative exam, ending their lesson in a real-world manner. 
  • Career Preparation – in preparation for their eventual college- and career-goals, my students developed career-and-college portfolios, took part in 15 hours of career experiences outside of class, and took part in an exit interview in which they connected the lessons learned in class to what they intended to do after high school. This component was pure acquisition-based education and provided a chance for their classroom-learned knowledge and skills to be applied.
What I have just described also happens to be very reflective of the structure of the 2015 AFNR National Standards, which are organized in three levels.

-       The broadest level entails the Common Career Technical Core (CCTC) Standards – these are standards that apply to all types of CTE courses.

-       Within the CCTC standards are the Performance Indicators. These are the “actual standards” as we typically think of them, and reflect what the National Council for Agricultural Education (or “The Council”) believes to be the specific content necessary for proficiency in a given agricultural course.
-      
Finally, each Performance Indicator has Sample Measurements. These sort of look like what we would assume are the standards, but are actually more like suggestions for what a teacher could provide in their curriculum to satisfy the Performance Indicators and the 2015 AFNR National Standards as a whole. 


The sample measurements are also reflective of problem solving approaches in education. These measurements are organized into three columns, with the leftmost column being the standards pertaining to awareness (terms, vocab, concepts, etc.). The middle column includes the intermediate concepts, which involve the application of the basic knowledge for a given Performance Indicator. The rightmost column includes the mastery concepts. These tend to focus on having students make predictions about unknown situations, apply lessons in a manner similar or identical to a workplace situation, or utilize large amounts of content to reach a conclusion. Notice that Mastery does not consist of perfect memorization of terms or concepts; this is still the Awareness level (the most basic of the three). Mastery can only come about when a student is able to apply their decision-making skills in a real-world scenario, often in a group-based situation that involves hypothesis formation, data collection & analysis, and communication of interpretations.

Examples of Student-Centered, Problem Solving Approaches
It took me the better part of a 10-year stretch in classrooms to reach a point in which I felt comfortable about my effectiveness with these methods and ideas (let alone to even realize that they existed). My work was far from perfect but my descriptions below might help you to get a better grasp of what I am describing.

One of my more-effective examples of using a problem-solving approach was in my introductory Agriscience course. This two-semester course focused on the scientific method, the carbon cycle, cellular respiration, and photosynthesis in the first semester, and on genetics and biotechnology in the second semester. This might sound very different from an introductory agricultural course in other schools, but the point was to enable my students to understand the systems that serve as the basis of all of agriculture, food and natural resources. Agriculture at its simplest is really about the acquisition of biomass in a manner that is productive for human needs. Photosynthesis serves as the source of all carbon for carbon-based life & biomass, respiration is the process in which these organic carbon molecules are used to produce the cellular energy (ATP) that is necessary for acquiring and building that biomass, and genetics pertains to how these processes can be made more efficient and productive. In short, if a student can understand these three processes, they are then capable of developing a deep comprehension of all factors, decisions, and considerations in any field of agriculture.

The unit on cellular respiration was a challenging one to teach, especially to a class primarily made up of freshmen in high school. As with all my lessons, students began with an Awareness portion of the material. After asking how the breakfast they had consumed an hour earlier became the energy they needed for the rest of the day (and making them aware of the gaps and misconceptions in their thinking), I allowed for time for students to independently complete a set of notes. Once students had developed a base of knowledge from which they could start the inquiry process, I provided them with the first example of Interaction; students had to work on dry erase boards in teams of four to develop five ways in which they could engineer the cells of cattle to produce more ATP, enabling the animals to become more productive. After a sufficient amount of time, I brought the students back together and randomly called on groups using a set of dice. Regardless of whether their ideas were right or wrong, I asked them to explain their rationale behind the ideas they proposed. I used another randomly-selected group to critique their ideas. We as a class came to a consensus about each idea, and my coaching ensured that they reached the right conclusions without “telling them the right answer” by questioning their responses so that they could see their own gaps in logic and knowledge. The most powerful tool I had in this phase was the phrase, “Tell me more…what are you thinking?”

After a quick multiple choice quiz to a) make sure that all students were at a level of proficiency necessary for moving on and b) to make sure that students took the time to ‘cement’ the knowledge in their mind, we moved on to the Mastery level. In the week that followed, students were challenged to determine the changes to cellular respiration that resulted from different kinds of carbohydrate “feeds” and explain these differences using their base knowledge from the previous week. To do this, students used yeast cells and measured the differences in the CO2 production during the respiration of different kinds of carbohydrates (sugar, starch, and fiber).

Students began with a cookie cutter lab so that they could become familiar with the equipment and protocols. They then redesigned the lab by changing an independent variable (e.g. adding caffeine, increasing the temperature, using fiber instead of sugar, etc.). They made their predictions about what effects the changes would cause, proposed rationales for their reasoning, collected data, identified patterns, and proposed models based on their prior material to explain their results. By the end of the week, they worked in teams completely unassisted by their instructor. Their reasoning was developed and critiqued within and among their groups. They applied their reasoning to other scenarios such as cattle or corn, knowing that their model organisms were representing the same cellular processes that occur in essentially all living organisms. While their education on the topic began as learning, it concluded with acquisition, ensuring that they could reach mastery while also being consciously aware of the specific set of knowledge and skill that they were mastering.

Other classes worked in a similar manner. My vet students first debated how and when sutures became necessary for a wound to fully heal before completing independent notes on the topic of suturing. This was followed by videos and demonstrations of me performing suturing, concluding with each student performing and practicing suturing on bananas. Students in my Agribusiness course discussed and then completed notes on the principles of marketing, followed by addressing hypothetical marketing scenarios for a business, and concluding with developing a marketing plan for their own future business that they could create while they were still in high school (which some did). Students in my Natural Resources class followed notes and discussion of habits with predictions and calculations of biodiversity in different portions of the school forest in relation to the quality of the habitat in those areas.

In each case, the instruction was designed to allow students to eventually address specific real-world problems or considerations. Student responses were not judged as right or wrong, but defendable or not defendable based on argumentation and discussion so as to allow them to function independently without their teacher. Students did not learn obscure facts as much as they learned underlying phenomena that helped them to explain real-world considerations such as why fertilizer was necessary for a field, how the type of crop affected the sustainability and carbon-neutrality of a biofuel, or how invasive species could decimate an ecosystem. Their education in my classroom often began as learning but continuously progressed until it was more about acquisition-based education through situations that were as real-world as a classroom environment could provide.

Conclusion
My high school French teacher once lamented that she couldn’t kidnap us and leave us alone in Paris. Looking back, I now realize two things: 1) that was a terrifying statement when taken out of context, and 2) she was absolutely correct in her realization that what we were learning in her classroom could never compare to how we could learn a language like French when immersed among native French speakers. Similarly, agricultural educators could never provide the level of education that could be achieved if our students could be immersed in an environment like a farm, forest, laboratory, clinic, or corporate headquarters. However, we can strive to create environments in our classrooms that reflect the real-world scenarios that occur only outside of high schools through strategies such as the problem solving approach.

Utilizing acquisition-based teaching methods such as the student-centered instruction, the problem-solving approach, inquiry-based education, experiential learning, and others can be challenging. Many teachers did not have similar experiences as students, making it hard to envision what this kind of curriculum might look and feel like in practice. It can often feel like students aren’t learning as much because they are covering fewer concepts (but gaining a much deeper comprehension of those concepts). Classroom management can be a challenge when students are encouraged to work in teams and converse with each other instead of just quietly taking notes or completing worksheets.

However, while these methods have their challenges, the benefits certainly seem to outweigh the drawbacks. If in doubt, remember back to your own student experiences and ask yourself which lessons were most enjoyable or most impactful. How many of us fondly remember taking multiple choice tests and writing endless notes? How many of us forgot all of the material on a long multiple choice exam by the time we got our grades back? On the other hand, how many of us really enjoyed taking part in labs that felt like real world situations? How many of us preferred to work in groups on projects in which we had some control and decision-making opportunities? How much more valuable did our education seem when it the connections to our future lives were unquestionably obvious? 


In my experience as a teacher, the greatest feeling of success only occurred when I knew I was no longer needed, when my students could stand with me as an equal and I could have confidence in knowing that their success in life was as inevitable as I could make it. Teaching isn’t about telling students the ‘right answers’, whatever they may be. Teaching is a profession in which we make sure that students leave us with the ability to ask questions, determine answers, solve problems, and think critically long after they have stopped worrying about the grades that we would assign to them. To ensure that this can occur, we must enable our students to practice functioning without us and create a classroom environment that enables this to happen on a daily basis.



Craig Kohn

@AgKohn

kohncrai@msu.edu

Previous Contributions to the AEE 412 Methods Blog by Mr. Kohn include:

Friday, September 23, 2016

Guest Blogger Series: Finding the sweet spot between the three circles- Using FFA and SAE to enhance your classroom.

Editor's Note: This blog is part of a series of guest contributors from the national school-based agricultural education family. Parker Bane has taught at Pontiac Township High School since 2003. Parker has been active in the Illinois Association of Vocational Agriculture Teachers, serving as President in 2011-2012, and the National Association of Agriculture Educators, serving as Region IV Vice President. Parker is a CASE Master Teacher and currently serves on the National FFA Foundation Board of Trustees. Parker's wife, Angie, teaches agriculture in Tremont, Illinois, and the couple currently resides in Towanda, IL with their daughter, Ella. 

Education is a profession filled with ritual and tradition.  From the silly hats worn by professors at collegiate commencement ceremonies to the signaling of time by metal bells, we educators have inherited a great number of traditions that have been and will continue to be passed from class to class.

One of those traditions for me is "the FFA unit" in Intro to Ag.  It's my chance to sell the organization that puts the "cult" in agriculture and get our newest students excited about the agriculture education model.  I'm not sure when it happened (I'm guessing sometime after I adopted the CASE Intro to AFNR curriculum), but eventually, I found myself trying to explain the ag ed model to students.  Over the course of my career, I have really liked how I explain the ag ed model to them.  I think it's not only a good starting point for my Intro to Ag students, but it is also a good starting point for this blog.

So...here's what I give them every year.

1.  I have them draw three circles in their notebooks together in Venn Diagram fashion.  All three circles intersect equally.

2.  I label the circles - Classroom Instruction.  FFA.  SAE.

3.  I then place the following bullet points underneath each circle's label.

  • Classroom Instruction -  "You will gain knowledge and start to develop skill.  Here is where you will learn content and concepts."
  • FFA - "You will get the opportunity to practice the knowledge you've gained and compete with other students to show that your knowledge is more than theirs.  You'll also get to develop leadership."
  • SAE - "In this circle, you will get to put this knowledge to work for you.  If you do this right, you'll grow beyond anything that I can teach you."
This is the foundation.  From here you have a choice.  Will you be an FFA Advisor that happens to teach a little bit, or will you become a true Ag Education Teacher?

The truth is, that I really believe that our paths as professionals are evolving and ever changing.  Education is a dynamic industry, and to be honest, there will be some days that you feel like you're sucked into the FFA vortex while other days, FFA and SAE will be the last things on which you'll want to focus.

Here are some tips that I've found for balancing the three circles and becoming a true Ag Education Teacher:

1.  Obtain and use solid curriculum resources.  Personally, I am very partial to CASE, but there are a lot of good curriculum materials out there.  Some of the "curriculum" that's out there is also absolute junk.  I purchased an "Agribusiness Pathway" from a respected curriculum provider, and after $1500 of investment, I found that there was literally NOTHING there but a couple of lessons on Job Interviewing.  I was disgusted (and haven't purchased anything from that vendor since).  Critically evaluate your materials and remember that if you use good curriculum materials, you will be less likely to neglect the Classroom Instruction circle.

2.  Recognize that FFA is supposed to reflect your curriculum.  This means that if you are a solid teacher of, let's say...Ag Sales, then your FFA chapter's Ag Sales team should be good.  Likewise, if you don't have much of a horticulture component to your program, then should you be spending the time and effort to train a Nursery and Landscape team?  See number 3 below for more on this topic.

3.  But...FFA is also an opportunity to differentiate.  We do not offer ag mechanics courses here, but the Ag Mechanics CDE gives us the opportunity to offer something mechanical to students that may want it.  You have to be really careful with this, though.  If the students do not have classroom instruction on which to build a knowledge base, then you're going to have to give that to them outside of class, which takes time and energy.

4.  We don't teach to the CDE, but sometimes, following the CDE rules leads to some really solid instruction.  As a rule, I have always felt like completing all of the tasks required in the National FFA Ag Sales CDE makes for an EXCELLENT ag sales unit in class.  In my mind, the same could be said for forestry.  As someone with very little forestry background, I found that in my natural resources courses (pre-CASE NRE), that using the FFA Forestry CDE tasks as the end objectives for my instructional units and designing the instruction backwards from there was a natural fit in my classroom.

As an added bonus, FFA CDE success energizes the classroom instruction underlying it.  In other words, winning breeds winning in other arenas.

5.  Use your students' SAE projects for instruction.  Right now, I have a student working the turf circuit at one of our local golf courses.  As we are coming up on our Turfgrass unit in Landscaping class, I asked if he could line up a tour and demo of the golf course's equipment.  Being immersed in the project every day, he has done an excellent job in setting up the tour for us.  I have used this strategy to set up many instructional experiences.

6.  Use SAE tools for instruction.  Some states have mandated record systems.  Others do not.  Many use AET.  Regardless of which system you use, I have found that asking students to complete and submit assignments using the platform of the SAE record system helps naturalize them to the system (and through it, SAE).  For example, AET has a great journal feature.  Every now and then, I will have the students complete reflection questions on the AET journal and submit them through that.

7.  Use SAE tools for FFA.  I LOVE the AET's FFA roster submission tool.  It eliminates the need for a separate (and exactly matching spreadsheet) for inputting new members into the FFA roster.  Just get the students into the system, have them fill out their profiles, check their names, and click send!  It's heavenly.

Truthfully, I could go on for hours about this topic.  These are just a few of the things that I've picked up over the years.  What questions can I help with?  Email me at pbane@pontiac90.org.

To see other Guest Blogger submissions from Mr. Bane:
2015 - Organizing your Instruction...Literally.

Submitted by:
Parker Bane, @parkerbane
 pbane@pontiac90.org
Agriscience Teacher
Pontiac Township

Guest Blogger Series: How does Change Affect Agricultural Education?

Editor note: Dr. Karen Hutchison is the current Local Program Success specialist assigned to Pennsylvania by National FFA. She is a former state supervisor of agricultural education from the state of Delaware and former agriscience teacher. 

Can agriculture education help students keep up with globalization and a changing world?  Does our current three component model of agriculture education; classroom/laboratory instruction, supervised agricultural experience programs (SAE), and the FFA, continue to prepare our students for change?  Can agriculture education prepare students to fill the need for more scientists and engineers?  The answer to all three questions is yes.
In his book, Living in a Flat World, author Thomas Friedman, wrote: “You can’t light the fire of passion in someone if it doesn’t burn in you to begin with.” Think back to who your favorite teachers were.  They probably were the ones that instilled a love of learning and were passionate about what they taught.  If our students are going to be prepared for a changing job market, agricultural educators need to be passionate about educating students in areas such as the science and technology of agriculture.

The Three-Component Model reflects the long established focus on classroom/laboratory, FFA and supervised agricultural experiences.

How can agriculture education produce curious, passionate students?  First, we need to make sure we have quality programs, programs that include all three components of the agriculture education model.  Classroom instruction is critical in providing students with an opportunity to learn by doing.  The agriculture classroom needs to be one of contextual learning where students are given a variety of learning experiences so they can make meaningful relationships between abstract ideas and practical applications.  Having a laboratory component to classroom instruction provides students an opportunity to make that connection.  This also means agriculture educators need to be aware of the changes in the agricultural industry and eager to learn themselves.  This can be accomplished through quality professional development, active advisory committees, and participation in conferences.

The SAE component encourages students to take something they have learned in the classroom and expand or deepen their understanding through a learning experience outside the classroom.   The SAE program is the actual, hands-on application of concepts and principles learned in the agriculture classroom supervised by agriculture education teachers in cooperation with parents, employers and other adults who assist students in the development and achievement of their educational and career goals.   The SAE component is unique and important to agriculture education.

The FFA component provides students an opportunity to participate at the local, state, and national levels in a variety of programs and activities designed to allow students to demonstrate what they have learned in their classroom.  As the mission states:  FFA makes a positive difference in the lives of students by developing their potential for premier leadership, personal growth and career success through agricultural education.”
One of the greatest strengths of the agriculture classroom is how students learn by doing.  Students work through experiments and projects, practicing until they understand.  Because agriculture is so multifaceted students should be able to find something that they are passionate about.  National FFA has resources for teachers such as My Journey and the new Ag Explorer, to help students explore the many agriculture areas and careers.

Have you used or considered a research-based SAE: (https://www.ffa.org/MyResourceDocuments/sae_handbook_V10.pdf).  As the description states:

 For scientific-minded students, research-based SAE projects and programs offer opportunities for innovation and new discovery in the growing area of agriscience. This type of SAE allows students to examine an agricultural/scientific issue, question or principle using experimental or non-experimental methods. In an experimental program, students conduct and develop scientific experiments to solve a problem or gain new knowledge. For non-experimental SAEs, students assume the role of “detective” to address a problem or answer a question through extensive research. In either case, the use of scientific principles, literature review, experiment/activity planning, data collection and information analysis is applied to arrive at a final conclusion.”

One only needs to attend a National FFA Convention and hear about the projects students in this category are conducting, to know our students do have the desire and ability to tap their passion.

National FFA has other programs to encourage and recognize students who are interested in pursuing a deeper understanding of the sciences to help promote change.  The AgriScience Fair provides an opportunity for middle and high school students, at the local, state, and national level, who are interested in the scientific principles and emerging technologies in the agricultural industry to develop research projects.   Using the scientific method students can pursue research in the areas of botany, engineering, environmental sciences, zoology, and biochemistry/food science/microbiology.  The AgriScience Fair continues to grow in the number of participants every year.


The best part of programs such as the AgriScience Fair or a research SAE is the opportunity to expose thousands of students to the exciting world of sciences, research, and emerging technologies.  As an agriculture educator it is rewarding to expose a student through a field trip or career awareness activity and have them say they have found what they want to do with their life. 

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack visiting with AgriScience Fair students about their research project.
The best part of programs such as the AgriScience Fair or a research SAE is the opportunity to expose thousands of students to the exciting world of sciences, research, and emerging technologies.  As an agriculture educator it is rewarding to expose a student through a field trip or career awareness activity and have them say they have found what they want to do with their life. 


As author Thomas Friedman wrote, “…. curious, passionate kids are self-educators and self-motivators”.
Thomas Friedman also wrote, “Give me a kid with a passion to learn and a curiosity to discover and I will take him or her over a less passionate kid with a high IQ every day of the week.  Because curious, passionate kids are self-educators and self-motivators.  They will always be able to learn how to learn, especially on the flat world platform, where you can both download and upload.” Agriculture education leads the way in creating curious, passionate kids.  Students should be given the opportunity to pursue deeper understanding of subjects that are of interest to them.  Agriculture educators need to make sure they are feeding that passion. 
          
Globalization is one change that has had and will continue to have a huge effect on the agriculture industry.  Agriscience educators have an obligation to make sure students are ready to enter this rapidly changing industry.  By providing an agriculture program that is built on the three core components of classroom/laboratory instruction, supervised agricultural experience programs, and FFA student organization activities/opportunities, agriculture students will be well on their way to finding success in a changing world.



Guest Blogger:
Karen Hutchison
Local Program Success
National FFA

302-270-2085

Wednesday, September 14, 2016

#psuaged17 Lab Protocol: SEVEN STEPS TO SUCCESS

#psuaged17,

So proud of you for working together to identify a protocol that fits "us" as a team for success as we practice our skills along our #TeachAG Journey and maximize our Professional Learning Network with Peer Feedback.

Here is a recap of the SEVEN STEPS to weekly Lab Success:

Pre-Lab:

Step 1. 
By 3:00pm on day before lab performance (Tuesday; Before AEE 413); Send complete lesson plan as a word document to Dr. Foster (foster@psu.edu)

During Lab:

Step 2.
Capture Lab Demonstration on your iPad Mini in Edthena

Step 3:
Artfully play the classroom management role during peer's performance and capture meaningful written feedback on the provided lab rubric.

Post Lab:

Step 4:
By 8pm on day of lab performance (Wednesday), Have Edthena Video uploaded and Labeled/Tagged for our Group

Step 5:
By 3pm on day after lab performance (Thursday; Before AEE 413), have watched your peers videos and provided your personal video analysis in Edthena

Step 6:
During AEE 412 on Friday, provide written feedback collected during Wednesday Lab to the "teacher"

Step 7: 
Post culminating personal lab reflection taking into account video feedback, peer written feedback, class instruction, and personal reflection to personal professional blog by 5pm. 

Foster Feedback for #psuaged17 Lab 2

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