Application of Situated Learning Theory to Skills Acquisition in the Environmental Sciences

Presented at: Canadian Water Resources Association, Gimli, MB

Dr. Shirley Thompson, Natural Resources InstituteJ.R. Stepaniuk - University of Manitoba and University College of the North-NRMT Program

Permission granted freely by students for all photos

Educational research typically begins with a ‘concern’ that arises because of a need, an interest, or a requirement. A standardized tactic for in-stream

discharge calculation methodology typifies such a need, and interest.

Manitoba Basins and Watershed Boundaries

Sub-basins within Drainage Area Flowing through Manitoba

Numerous incorporated variables will be examined during development of this normative practitioner research project arguing for beneficence of ecologically intelligent tertiary education curriculum design and delivery.

Environmental skills acquisition will be built on culturally relevant facilitation and problem-based learning modalities.

Applied action-practitioner research, participatory video, situated learning and Most Significant Change Theory will be used to create and evaluate an in-stream discharge calculation curricular platform.

To Reiterate, the sector of interest is …

• Concern for learning and facilitating,• Factors of student success and persistence,• Essential “just-in-time” skills and knowledge,• Allowances for ‘apprentices’ to take in-class portion

of training without having to leave family, community, and employment for extended periods.

The perceived strategy for enabling learners that are disengaged to make successful transition to, and through, post-secondary training is the ‘aim’.

Research considers the relationship between a cohort of Natural Resources Management Technology Program students, mastery of technical skill,

technological availability and chronotopic program attrition rates.

Present Research ContextDissertation research proposes to examine an educational

challenge promoting a more culturally pragmatic insight through practitioner research and a participatory video approach while identifying how post-secondary students may obtain standardized technical environmental understanding of, and participation in, a regional stream discharge monitoring activity.

Definition of “Discharge”

Stream flow or “discharge” is the quantity (or volume) of water passing through a cross section of a stream channel per unit time.

Why Measure Discharge?

Simply, the method and technique presented here represents: (1.) good practice in current use, (2.) is applicable to routine resource related agency habitat assessment needs, and (3.) post-secondary natural resource technology curriculum requirements internationally.

Wide ranging objectives are essentially to:

1) construct & evaluate a culturally relevant prototype curriculum tool and platform for use in an ecological and educational setting; and

2) suggest a projected and hypothesized rationale for use and dissemination in an autocatalytic fashion.

Objectives seek significance in answering:

1) Is a culturally relevant situated learning theory and participatory video project applicable to acquisition of environmental skill?

2) Does a culturally relevant situated learning and participatory video project enhance understanding achieved through traditional classroom-based instruction?

3) Will the Most Significant Change Technique as a form of participatory monitoring and evaluation increase visibility of processes of organizational observation under investigation?

Why an Inter-disciplinary Approach?

For flora and fauna, habitats are areas where assemblages can find the physical and chemical features required for life (i.e. spawning sites, feeding areas, abundance, migration routes as well as species composition and biodiversity assemblages).

Why an Inter-disciplinary Approach?• Habitats are relatively stable through

time, easily defined in intuitive physical

terms, and provide a tangible resource

for negotiations and decision-making.

• Habitat is now the basis of many forms

of species management, mitigation

planning, environmental regulation, and

impact assessment.

• Fisheries management has traditionally

focused on population levels, however,

in past decades fisheries and resource

agencies have increasingly employed

habitat-based approaches for inventory.

Goals of the Project

• To provide an opportunity to bring together concepts, information and methodologies learned and researched in all NRI core courses.

• Provides the opportunity to be advised and consult with others while developing and working on the project.

• The Doctoral research is an “action-practitioner oriented” research paper addressing an issue in existing organizations.

• The challenge is a practical one in that it is identifiable in researchable terms, it is work related, and it is oriented toward long-term benefits.

Why this Activity?

• Most educational institutions and environmentally related agencies use ad hoc teaching and training procedures having no real established and consistent habitat assessment methods training documentation.

• The ‘reason’ stated … is that most companies conducting habitat assessments report they use various methods depending on the involved personnel, agencies involved, and their associated requests.

• Moreover, various approaches and procedures are involved simply because of the limitless range of post-secondary curriculums, instructor-based facilitation, organizational aims, and vernacular skill sets of both graduating students and summer, part-time, and new employees requiring pragmatic upgrading.

Why this Activity? (cont.)

• This research effort will help foster a more strategic analysis of habitat quality (i.e., Conservation District Managers efficiently identifying priority habitat features (zones) that impede bio-stability through ecologically intelligent public participation measures).

• The developed Product would be useful for monitoring effects of land use, possible changes to and degradation of aquatic habitat associated with land use practices in a watershed resulting from human activities such as drainage, agriculture, logging, road construction, and more.

• Eventually, current habitat (Conservation District) conditions could be described throughout a broad spatial scale and the data could be stored in a retrievable manner (e.g., internet) efficiently and strategically province.

Why this Activity? (cont.)

This researched platform could be utilized for assessing habitat improvement activities (i.e., evaluating the success of management decisions) so when management defines specific quantifiable objectives for a habitat improvement project or the citizenry, changes in habitat are evaluated through a systematic and standard assessment program facilitated through a Developed Curriculum platform reform.

Beneficence of Research?

This research effort is intended to provide an advanced Curricular, Training, and Information platform created with the aid of post-secondary student forces, government agencies and educational institutions with Target Audiences including: secondary, post-secondary, public-private corporations, non-profit community groups.

Research will suggest a delivery avenue not yet explored to disseminate ecologically intelligent knowledge … a “new paradigmatic science.”

A Possible Scenario?• The Product will promote not only a training and educational

platform … but suggest an avenue for tertiary educational forces to potentially aid provincial water resource strategy.

• Composite indices could ultimately be submitted by students (respondents in schools) reporting mainly habitat data. Eventually, through similar Product Development platforms, indices of biotic health (community composition or fish population status) could be provincially facilitated and transmitted from school to provincial management to the public … and back … and forth …

• Predictions made by agencies for priority projects would resultantly be much more efficient, economical, and time-wise.

• Such a reporting format via an ecologically intelligent way (i.e., Internet) could possibly enhance databases and/or improve the enhancement of existing resource related databases.

A Possible Scenario? (cont.)

• Identifying the presence, location, type, and amount of habitat could virtually be accomplished by students who are prospective employees (i.e. an economically viable and intelligent labor force presently ill-utilized).

• Product Development and dissemination philosophy alone (in coaching, reporting results and distributing an understanding of ecologically important concepts) would groom students for immediate and active employment following graduation.

• The benefit … generating a technologically proficient ecologically astute citizenry more willing and able to act strategically.

Potential Resources

Manuals

Plug and Play

Summary & Conclusion

Conclusion (1 of 3)

• Most public and private provincial resource agencies and educational institutions with environmental science responsibilities use “some type” of established method for in-stream flow assessment and monitoring.

• A substantial portion of these agencies have been relying on ‘ad hoc’ procedures … as is instructional staff in educational institutions.

• Specific but inconsistent approaches are being used. Determinations of

discharge are presently being facilitated and based upon field investigator

judgment, past experience, and instructor-based training and interests …

THIS IS THE GAP.

Conclusion (2 of 3)

• Because of today’s sharply contrasting approaches used in habitat assessment, the aspects of In-stream Discharge Methodology and Development warrant investigation … solution … providing managers and educators with standardized pragmatic guidance.

• Such a move to control the proliferation of measurements, field techniques, and curriculum variances … only makes sense.

• Otherwise, striving to cope with individualized data storage, variable field-technician reporting, instructor-based training, and more … will continue in an unfocused and unstrategic manner.

Conclusion (3 of 3)

• As agencies seek to report on habitat resources beyond the site-specific scale, sampling design and educational considerations will become critical in the utility of data now being accumulated.

• The dominant purpose of the Doctoral research is to standardize facilitation of In-stream Discharge Measurement field sampling procedure and technique. Additionally, the philosophy will open traditionally unexplored avenues for geometric advances in knowledge delivery and transfer.

• I anticipate that most agencies and Educational Institutions are in an active period of advancing their efforts. This research Product and resultant philosophy, theoretical considerations, and assumptions for information dissemination … are ripe.