We gave it a try now our students love Sakai!

John Harper & Geoff Burrows

School of Agricultural & Wine SciencesCharles Sturt University

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SummaryBotany

– First Year subject – Approx 50 students on campus & 100 DE students

–Interact• Announcements – Active engagement with students• Blogs - Introductions• Wikis –collaboration – dictionary ; mnemonics• Test Centre – Formative assessment• Chat room – chat with each other & lecturer• Forum & subforums – questions; organisation• Resources – Lectures; quizzes; past exams; links…..

– Podcasts – headsup!

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–Interact• Announcements – Active engagement with students

New resources hints on studyFun learning community

“Reach out and Touch somebody!”

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• Blogs – Introductions……

– 1% carrot– I got to know the students better and they learned

about each others aspirations and backgrounds and fears!

– Some study groups formed

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• Wikis –collaboration – dictionary ; mnemonics

Dictionary in our own words:

Micropyle: Point where pollen tube enters ovary. Also, later becomes the opening where water taken into seed for germination

A small hemeroid?

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A joint project between Team Botany and students

Unit 1Very Small Dogs Sniff Feet – Vascular tissue, Sporophyte Dominant, Seed, FruitEvolutionary leaps from mosses to angiosperms. Mnemonic- thanks to my mum’s dog Benji

Kids Playing Chicken On Freeways Get Squashed:Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species

All Good Pterodactyls Like Broccoli:     Angiosperms, Gymnosperms, Pteridophytes, Lycophytes, Bryophytes

Botany Mnemonics

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• Test Centre – Formative assessment

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• Chat room – chat with each other & lecturer• Forum & subforums – questions; organisation

– Needed to remind students that I wasn’t ‘waiting’ in the room for their questions!

– Organised times for chatting via chat room organiser – subforum

– Requests for chats with me or others

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• Podcasts – headsup!• Resources – Lectures; quizzes; past

exams; links…..

Verbal Directions

Pod casts of past exam answers

Double Fertilisation

Tutorial

Double Fertilisation

1. Label the diagram in the next slide

2. List and explain the key steps involved in double fertilization and its outcomes. Starting point is the 2 nuclei (1 & 2 in the diagram on the next slide) approaching a structure that contains 8 nuclei.Note the two nuclei in 1 & 2 are different from those at the top of the diagram

Double Fertilisation exam Question

Double Fertilsation explainedAnimation

• http://www.emunix.emich.edu/~ghannan/systbot/NewFiles/animation%203801.swf

After viewing the animationTry the exam question

Supermarket Botany!

See: http://www.csu.edu.au/research/grahamcentre/education/

“Just a pinch of this underground stem in your curry……”

What the students say………….“ I felt part of a learning community”

“I knew that my questions would be answered quickly”

“I love the exam answer keys”

“I put the verbal directions on my mobile..”

“I’ve discovered that learning can be fun!”

In summary

OK so Interact may be a bit clunky but it is lightyears ahead of the forum for enabling a learning community

I’m looking forward to Sakai 3!

John