Sustainability

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Sustainability

• Winter 2009
• First Class
• Jeff Fletcher

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Welcome Back!

• You survived the first quarter of your freshman
  year.
• Congratulations !
• As we did first quarter, make the most of our
  time here at PSU.
• Have an open mind.
• Get to know people different from yourself.
• Push yourself to try new things.
• Be filled with goodwill, interpret others
  actions in the same light.
• Have a positive attitude, look for opportunities
  not barriers.

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Whats Happening This Term?

• Our study this term is broken into these Units
• Evaluation (1 day)
• reflect on last term new policies and plans
• Collapse (4 weeks)
• Modern Society, Sustainability, and Community
  Building (1 week)
• Water and Sustainability (1 weeks)
• Food and Sustainability (3 weeks)

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What Major projects will we do?

• Research Paper
• Study a society from the Collapse text, including
  library research, and write a research paper on
  it that assesses its reasons for success or
  failure
• Includes peer reviewed drafts
• Group Presentation
• With others that researched the same society,
  prepare a group oral presentation
• Water Footprint Research Report
• Similar to last terms carbon footprint report,
  but will spend more time collecting data on your
  personal water usage and habits that affect water
  usage
• Also includes peer reviewed drafts
• Essay Exam (take-home)
• Covering material on water and food systems,
  especially The Omnivores Dilemma text
• Final Reflection Essay and Portfolio Preparation
• Construct an on-line portfolio illustrating your
  grasp of the UNST goals
• We will learn about web-page design this term.

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What other work will be graded?

• Attendance
• Be here, be on time, do not leave during class
• Homework Assignments, e.g. short 1-2 page papers
  and worksheets
• Participation
• Activities that demonstrate preparation for class
  (worksheets, first drafts, materials for peer
  review)
• Quizzes and worksheets testing reading
  comprehension
• Many small assignments done in main class and
  mentor session
• Class participation
• Contributing to discussions
• Staying on task during class and mentor session

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How will I be graded?

• 25 (125 points) Class participation and
  attendance
• Attendance both main and mentor sessions (25
  points)
• Attendance at 32/38 (84) of main and mentor
  classes required to pass
• Main session in-class activities (quizzes,
  worksheets, group work, etc) (30 points)
• Mentor session in-class activates (worksheets,
  1st drafts, peer review, group work, etc) (30
  points)
• Class Participation in Main class (20 points)
• Class Participation in Mentor Sessions (20
  points)
• 75 (375 points) Assignments and Projects
  including
• Collapse Research Paper (75 points)
• Collapse Group Presentation (50 points)
• Water Footprint Report (75 points)
• Essay take-home exam (75 points)
• Homework (75 points)
• Final Reflection Essay (25 points)

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Required Textbooks

• Collapse How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
  (2005)
• by Jared Diamond.
• Omnivores Dilemma (2006)
• by Michael Pollan
• Ways of Writing A Guide to College Composition,
  2nd Edition. (2008)
• by Bergland, Daneen, et al

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Last Term Positives

• Diverse class diverse experiences and
  backgrounds good sharing and group discussions
• Gained significant understanding of Global
  Warming issues
• Gained significant understanding of impact of
  some human activities to earth systems
• Gained significant understanding of personal
  impact and accountability
• A demonstrated improvement in critical thinking,
  writing, and working with numbers and graphs
• 1 on 1 sessions
• Good rapport with mentor helps with feeling
  comfortable at PSU

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Last Term Areas to Improve (Students)

• Be more involved in discussions
• more engaged and interactive
• staying on task
• Take better/more notes
• Starting projects/papers sooner
• leave more time for editing papers
• Get more help on editing drafts

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Last Term Areas to Improve(us)

• Explore issues of diversity (race, class, gender,
  sexual orientation, ethnicity)
• Speaking and analysis skills, examining own
  learning
• More engaging activities
• Less time on logistics and lectures more group
  work and variety
• More control of class, need to stop side
  conversations, keep us on topic
• More structured mentor sessions, more connected
  to main class, more help with assignments
• Less student 1st

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Some Changes Towards Course Improvement

• More group activities in main and mentor session
• Deliverables for most group work (and other
  activities) in main and mentor session
• Becomes part of participation grade
• Every chair faces forward when having whole class
  or mentor session discussions or presentations
• Much stricter about course rules (side
  conversations, texting, leaving during class)
• New late assignment policy
• Homework, quizzes, in-class activatesNO LATE
  PAPERS
• If you wont be in class or will be late, be sure
  you send homework before due date
• Major papers
• 10 off per day late (or portion thereof)
• One free day (or portion thereof) per term

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What else can we do to improve the class?

• Brainstorm and Discussion
• What can I do?
• What can Ross do?
• What can you do?

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First Reading Assignment

• Read Collapse
• Prologue A Tale of Two Farms
• (pp. 1 - 25)
• Due next class 01-07-09
• Read carefullythere may be a quiz on Wednesday
• There is a study guide, read it first, and then
  see if you can find the answers for the study
  guide as you read

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First Writing Assignment (HW1)

• Today in mentor session listen to radio show
  segment on bad apples in groups (also what
  helps groups)
• Take notes as you listen
• Write 2 page paper focused on your own behavior
  in groups (both helpful and harmful)
• Assume audience has not read assignment handout
• Due 1 week from today
• These will be peer reviewed

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Class Discussions

• Everyone to participate in class discussions. To
  facilitate this we will follow these rules.
• One person speaks at a time
• but everyone is expected to speak
• Honor all opinions
• Respond to ideas, not people
• Silence is Not consent
• No put-downs
• Be presentactively listen and respond
• no texting, email, side conversations etc.
• No rat holes
• As the moderator, I reserve the right to cut off
  discussion on topics that deteriorate
• You can also note when discussion is getting off
  topic
• To get more of you involved, I will call on
  people at random
• If you dont know or dont have anything to
  contribute, you can pass
• Try not to pass too often as this will affect
  your participation grade

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Multitasking

• In groups of 3, pick one test subject
• preferably some one that thinks they are a good
  multitasker
• Also pick a timer and a scorer
• Give your subject a blank piece of paper and a
  writing utensil
• On the next slide subjects should write down what
  is asked for as quickly and accurately as
  possible. There are two tests. For each
• the timer should time seconds from start to
  finish
• the scorer will score the results for accuracy
  after each test

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Tests

• Test 1 Write down the color of each word (not
  what the word says) in order from left to right
• red   blue   orange   purple   green  black 
  yellow   pink brown
• Timers record the time, scorers note any mistakes
• Answer blue   red   purple   orange   black 
  brown  pink  turquoise green
• Test 2 Write down the color of each word (not
  what the word says) in order from left to right
• dog dog dog   dog dog   dog   dog dog
  dog   
• Timers record the time, scorers note any mistakes
• Answer turqoise green blue black red
  purple pink orange brown
•        

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Questions for Groups

• Answer the following questions in your group on
  the back of your test page make sure all group
  members names are on it
• In your opinion, why did one test take longer or
  generate more errors than the other?
• What does this tell us about the brains ability
  to attend to more than one thing at a time?
• Can you come up with other ways to test how
  efficient (or not) multitasking can be?

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Multitasking Summary

• Using similar color word test, in1935 American
  psychologist John Ridley Stroop first reported
  that processing the information for one task can
  cause "interference" with another
• What are the two tasks in our experiments?
• Reading the words (subconscious)brain must
  suppress
• Naming the colors (conscious)
• Now known as the Stroop effect,
• Conclusion is that conscious attention is a
  limited resource
• The brain cannot really multitask where conscious
  attention is requiredat best it can cycle
  through tasks, but there is a cost to switching
  back and forth

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Multitasking Info

• http//csecacademics.info/braintraining/limitsofmu
  ltitasking.html
• http//www.theatlantic.com/doc/200711/multitasking
  
• http//www.cio.com/article/29708/Multitasking_Wast
  es_Time_and_Money
• http//www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/05/08053
  1084958.htm