David Mogk Department of Earth Sciences Montana State University mogk@montana and

1. SYNTHESIS OF RESEARCH ON THINKING & LEARNING IN THE GEOSCIENCES: GEOSCIENCE EXPERTISE DEVELOPED THROUGH LEARNING IN THE FIELD David Mogk Department of Earth Sciences Montana State University mogk@montana.edu and Charles Goodwin Department of Applied Linguistics University of California at Los Angeles cgoodwin@humnet.ucla.edu

2. Nature Inspires Geologic Thinking • Hutton: unconformities and “deep time” • Agassiz: global ice ages • Wegener: continental drift • Wilson: plate tectonics The grand concepts derive from field observations and related interpretational skills: uniformitarianism, the extent of geological time, evolution and the history of life, and plate tectonics. Butler, 2008

3. Learning in the Field • Going out into the natural environment • Sampling, measuring, mapping Earth in all its wonderful complexity • Looking at the raw materials of Nature, not derivative or synthetic products • Open, unconstrained, dynamic and complex systems—a challenging learning environment

4. What is the Role of Field Instruction in the Modern Geology Curriculum? • Contemporary realities • Changing emphases in geo-curriculum • Increased use of technology in classroom • Increased emphases on modelling, theory, analysis • Logistical issues; liability, cost, time, access • What is the evidence that “field work is good?” • An issue that has vexed geologists for generations:

5. “It is stated, as a scandalous sign of the times, that in certain departments geologic mapping is considered to be, not research, but a routine operation—something like surveying from the point of view of an engineer—and therefore not suitable as a basis for the doctoral thesis.” J. Hoover Mackin, 1963

6. Attributes of Geoscience ExpertiseWe have quite an arsenal of cognitive strategies! • Knowing how to "read" and "tell the story" of Earth, • Spatial and temporal reasoning, across many scales • Asking appropriate questions about Earth; knowing how to find out • Integrating numerous lines of evidence; analogous reasoning and inference; uncertain or incomplete data

7. Attributes of Geoscience ExpertiseWe have quite an arsenal of cognitive strategies! • Knowing what to look for, and what to exclude in complex natural settings; pattern recognition • Rationalize the results of experimental or modeling outcomes through ground-truthing in natural phenomena or events; • Simultaneously interrogating the Earth system from a reductionist/analytical and synthetic/integrative points of view • The ability to cope with the unexpected, to have a "fertile mind"

8. Field Learning EnvironmentWhat is unique, or at least intrinsic, to learning in the field? • Scale is large relative to student; perception from an internal spatial viewpoint; “zoom” across scales; temporal and spatial reasoning • Physical movement in the environment • Knowledge of spatial relations stored in memory, available for retrieval for later use • Experience can’t be reproduced in artificial or virtual environments • Strong sensory inputs • Experience with raw, undistilled Nature • Make decisions about what is important, what to exclude

9. Integration • Across many temporal and spatial scales • Systems thinking, interactions among and between • Physical, chemical, biological and human elements • Observations based on • Nature/field, experimental, analytical, theoretical and modeling (conceptual, numerical, computational) approaches

10. Learning in the field is all about variability: • of Earth, in the diversity of natural phenomena • of individuals, who come to study Earth with different abilities, interests and motivations; and • of the community of Geoscientists, whose inquiries about Earth mobilize an array of strategies, practices, tools, and representations.

11. Learning in the field is also about transformation: • as recorded in the history and evolution of Earth, • in individuals, with personal growth measured by mastery of knowledge, development of skills, and maturation of personal values and ethics in their conduct of science, and • in the community of practice of Earth science, as new approaches, tools, and knowledge are brought to bear to understand Earth

12. The Value of Field Work in the Geosciences • Opportunity to learn FROM Nature and ABOUT Science as a social enterprise • Inquiry and direct experiential contact with the raw materials of Nature, • An emphasis on observation and interpretation of natural phenomena and historical relations • Integration of content knowledge, observation and interpretation, analysis, experiment and theory and all their representations . • Emphasis on question-asking, observation, representation, and communication • Mechanism to recruit and retain students, to introduce non-traditional students to the geosciences;

13. Competence in Geoscience Thinking 1) Knowledge about Earth and the ability to use data to make testable inferences about Earth processes, structure, and history, that developed in deep time 2) The development of specific, complex skills (intellectual, technical, practical, interpersonal, and personal) that are applied to understanding Earth through 3) Mastery of the methods and tools that geoscientists use to interrogate Earth, including the systematic construction of diverse graphic representations that organize observations, measurements and data collected in the field in ways that provide new insights and that allow questions to be asked, tested and answered while making available

14. Learning Opportunities Afforded Through Field Instruction • Exploration of 3- and 4-dimensional relations in Nature; provides a sense of scale (spatial and temporal) • A holistic view of Earth that reveals the interconnections among the many components of the Earth system; relationships not just parts. • See relationships that demonstrate or validate theory, and to critically evaluate the adequacy of model output • Engage "authentic" activities done by professionals • Allows students to make their own observations, order their experiences, make decisions and set their own priorities as to what to focus on and what to ignore, towards becoming autonomous, self-directed learners.

15. Field Work Viewed From • Cognitive psychology • Learning Sciences • Anthropology • Cognitive Linquistics Provides fresh insights into how geoscientists learn in the field and from each other.

16. Cognitive Gains from Learning in the Field • Develop higher order thinking skills • Comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis evaluation; Bloom 1965 • Deep understanding through experiential learning (Kolb, 1984; Bransford et al., 1999) • Natural phenomena in their full environmental context, connections and relations • Interdisciplinary, using full range of content knowledge • Emphasis on inquiry and discovery

17. Affective Gains from Learning in the Field • Awe, wonder, aesthetics, curiosity • Intra- and inter-personal impacts • Attitudes, values, beliefs, motivations…. • Ability to work in groups, collaborative and cooperative learning • Increased self-confidence, self-reliance • Life-long memories; poignant experiences • Networking, Relations (mentor-peer; peer-peer)

18. Metacognitive Gains from Learning in the Field Students must be: • Self-aware of their approach • Self-monitoring of their progress • Self-regulating as they modify approaches when confronted with emerging problems or inconsistencies • Capable of • Planning, goal-setting • Critical-thinking • Conation—knowledge and affect lead to intentional, goal-oriented actions

19. Engaging the Community of Practice • A long apprenticeship is required • Novice-master interactions in natural setting • Language • Organized skills and practices; speech and gesture • Selection and use of appropriate tools • Communal ethics, values, expectations • Efficient work habits, • Stimulates independent thinking, • Engages decision-making strategies • Personal work ethics • Collaboration communication skills “The best geologist is the one who has seen the most rocks" (H.H. Read, 1939)

20. Selection and Use of Tools • Norms of community practice are established by experience • Tools, situated seeing, and work practices are required to make the inscriptions that define both work and knowledge • Knowing what to look for, what to do…

21. Inscriptions • Representations of natural phenomena • Portable, successively refined to emphasize a specific idea; but, lose the larger context, complexity • The first inscription is most important, changing Nature into Culture (i.e. artifacts such as maps, graphs, diagrams…) • Enhance understanding of Nature by using increasingly refined representations • A “chain” of inscriptions, feeding back and forth from field to analysis • Close linkages between embodied practices and creation of inscriptions

22. Chain of Inscriptions Goodwin, Things and Their Embodied Environments, figure 3. First inscription in “Cascade of Inscriptions” First inscription: The moment when “nature is transformed into culture" (Goodwin, 2000)

23. Braided Stream of Inscriptions • Integrative • Iterative

24. Embodiment • Importance of body in human cognition • How to act in the world, touching, moving reveals multiple perspectives • “Knowing your way around”; oriented in conceptual and physical space • Immersion in the natural environment • Affective experiences encode important information • Relevant Nature is systematically observed, studied, inscribed. • Fires all the senses—a powerful affective response that impacts cognition, memory, learning • Requires broad and sustained exposure to natural variations of Earth materials, structures, processes

25. Embodied Cognition in the Landscape Instructor simultaneously observes Nature and student’s actions Displaying structure in the earth through gesture Folded notebook as an inscription to represent orientation and style of folding

27. At first, the whole enterprise seemed utterly random …Chuck and I would look at the same patch of ground. I saw nothing but rock--barren desert floor. Chuck saw fossil teeth, jaws and even chunks of skull…I wanted him to describe exactly how to find bones. Over and over he told me to look for "something different". ..Finally, one day, I saw my first piece of tooth glistening in the desert sun. The enamel had a sheen that no other rock had…The difference was this time I finally saw it, saw the distinction between rock and bone. All of a sudden, the desert floor exploded with bone; where once I had seen only rock, now I was seeing little bits and pieces of fossil everywhere, as if I were wearing a special new pair of glasses. Neil Shubin (2008) Your Inner Fish, a Journey Into the 3.5 Billion Year History of the Human Body Tiktaalik

28. Field-based Teaching & Learning Major unanswered question: Which cognitive and affective aspects of geoscience learning can only be done, or can best be done, through field-based learning?

29. Implications for Geoscience Curriculum

31. "The field is where the truth resides; it is the essential core of geology. Models are essential figments of the imagination which must be tested by observation. Those who do no field work and do not gather data will never understand geology" (John Dewey, quoted in Butler, 2008).

32. Get out into Nature early and often… The Earth never tires, The Earth is rude, silent incomprehensible at first, Nature is rude and incomprehensible at first, Be not discourag'd, keep on, there are divine things well envelop'd, I swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell. Walt Whitman Leaves of Grass Song of the Open Road

33. Future Research • What is the interaction of cognitive, affective and psychomotor skills required to perform fieldwork? • How can field instruction be adopted and adapted to address variation in students' learning styles, backgrounds, experience, and demographics • Characterization of geoscience expertise • What is the evidence that field learning experiences are important to the overall professional development of geoscientists? • How can geoscientists' cognitive strategies be translated into effective instructional practices, such that students can learn science by doing science in the field? • What can be done to prepare students to learn in the field? What content or concepts are necessary for students to be successful in a field learning experience? What is the proper sequencing of field learning experiences? • What is the appropriate role of using instructional technology in field instruction • What motivates students to learn in the field and what are the barriers? • What are the longitudinal impacts on students' success in geoscience that can be attrributed to field study? • How can we assess the impacts of field experiences on student learning? • Ethnographic and linguistic studies are needed to study geoscientists as they pursue their craft in the field • There is a compelling need for collaborative research between geoscientists and specialists in the cognitive and learning sciences