Program learning outcomes for course
Specific student learning outcomes for course and assessment or evidence of accomplishment
| Botanic | |
|---|---|
| Outcomes | Assessment |
| Identify local plants by local and scientific names. | Hikes include question and answer sessions using plants in the field. These field experiences are documented primarily by photographs. Theoretically these oral field experiences would be best documented as videos, but storage and sharing of the documentation is considered to be problematic. Generating web pages with static images appears to be a reasonable compromise. Ultimately the only way to assess the assessment would be for an assessor to take students back into the field and query the students on the plant names. Presentations of healing, food, and material culture plants also includes local names and scientific names. This material is then assessed on tests [fall 06] and the midterm [sp 07, fall 06]. |
| Compare and contrast the distinguishing reproductive characteristics of different phyla of plants including mosses, seedless vascular plants, gymnosperms, and angiosperms. | The seedless vascular plant presentations [sp 06] material was assessed in part by questions on test one. Student groups also presented material on gymnosperm, angiosperm life cycles and gymnosperm leaf types. Assessment of gymnosperms included material on the midterm [sp 07, fall 06]. A visit to the Pwunso botanic garden includes specific coverage of gymnosperms. [ fall 07, sp 07, fall 06, sp 06, fall 05, sp 05, fall 04, sp 04, 2000, 1999, 1998 ] |
| Label the key morphological features of the different phyla of plants including mosses, seedless vascular plants, gymnosperms, and angiosperms including the morphology of the reproductive structures. | The students produced labeled diagrams and performed presentations for seedless vascular plants [sp 07, fall 06, fall 05 ], gymnosperms [fall 06], and angiosperms [fall 06]. Walks were taken during which vegetative morphology [ sp 07, fall 06] and floral morphology [sp 07] were discussed. During these walks oral questions are asked to check for understanding. Fruit morphology was covered in a "bring a fruit to class" day, |
| Ethnographic | |
| Outcomes | Assessment |
| Communicate and describe the healing uses of local plants and the cultural contexts in which that healing occurs. | The students each brought a plant and gave a presentation to the class on the healing use of that plant [Notes from prior terms]. As a part of this unit students tour a traditional plant garden containing over a hundred local healing plants. |
| Contribute, participate in, and experience eating local food made from plants and describe the production process. | Students brought in foods, described the production process, and experienced eating those foods in a set of food presentations [ fall 06, sp 06, fall 05 ]. |
| Communicate and describe the use of plants for transportation, for shelter, and in other material culture applications. | A lecture-discussion was engaged in on the ways in which plants provide housing, shelter, furnishing, tools, transportation, clothing, decoration, adornment, traditional cosmetic compounds, tattoos, and handicrafts. The class visited [fall 06] a virgin coconut oil processing plant to observe an economically productive use of plants in the realm of material culture. Students made presentations
[fall 06,
Sp 04,
Sp 03]
on the material cultural uses of plants in their cultures. |
| Describe and observe the use, role, and importance of psychoactive plants within their traditional ceremonial cultural contexts. | Images from a traditional cultural ceremony [ sp 07, fall 06, sp 06, fall 05, sp 05, sp 04, sp 03 ]. |
| [optional] Participate in the development and maintenance of an ethnobotanical garden. | Students started the term by cleaning up the ethnobotanical garden and getting to know the plants in the garden. At midterm the students revisited the garden, again cleaning up and identifying the plants in the garden. At term's end the students prepared the garden for the addition of their own culturally significant plants. Planting occurred on 06 December 2007. [ sp 07c, sp 07b, fall 06 ] Diagram of garden. • Ethnobotanical garden map as Scalable Vector Graphic in xhtml |
Ethnobotany • Botanical herbarium • Ethnobotanical herbarium • Courses • COMFSM
