This course will be conducted entirely on the World Wide Web. There are no set class meeting times, but you will be required to complete weekly assignments. Registered students in this course will need to navigate between two environments in the World Wide Web. These are:
We will use this website to house instructional materials that I have created.
Canvas [1] is Penn State's course management system. We will use Canvas for turning in assignments, receiving feedback and grades, reading assignments, and discussions.
NOTE: Only students who are registered for this course will have access to the Canvas space for this course. Students who register for this Penn State course gain access to assignments and instructor feedback and earn academic credit.
You will use library e-reserves to access the scientific articles we'll read in this course. There's a link to the PSU library site in the Resources drop-down menu on this website.
There are seven procedural lessons total that will be completed at a rate of either one or two weeks per lesson. Lesson learning activities will be in the form of programming exercises and reading and discussion revolving around data and concept visualization in the Earth sciences. For the projects, you will use skills you've learned to create visualizations and a teaching instrument of your choice.
Download and get familiar with the programming language we'll use in this course.
Write programs with colors and for loops. Discuss visualization skills and their classifications.
Write programs that simulate animation using if - else if - else structures. Discuss strategies to teach visualization skills.
Write programs that involve interactivity. Discuss how to measure the worth of a graphic.
Write programs involving typography. Discuss strategies to incorporate animations as learning tools.
Write programs using a 3D renderer. Save program output.
Use data arrays to manipulate and plot data.
Create two projects that make use of skills learned in Lessons 1-7.
Create a lesson plan on the topic of your choice.
In EARTH 801, I will rely upon a variety of methods to assess and evaluate student learning, including:
These provide opportunities for me to gauge your progress and ability to articulate key concepts. I will assign weekly readings and ask you to discuss and debate the significance of these readings within the larger framework of the current lesson's topic. The discussions will also be a venue for you to get help or give help when performing the data analyses.
You will write small procedural programs.
These will be used to evaluate your knowledge and skills through the production of programs that demonstrate your ability to visualize a data set and to use data viz skills to teach course concepts to your own students.