Abstract Detail

Teaching Section

Wandersee, James H. [1], Clary, Renee M. [2].

How Did Linnaeus Integrate Botany Teaching and Research? Insights from His University, Garden, Home, and Farm.

At a time when many botanists consider the history of science to be tangential to their current work, and when journal article references to work conducted at any time interval greater than a decade beyond the present are deemed outdated or insipid, it can be argued that exemplars of excellence drawn from great botanists of the past can still inspire and inform faculty and students today. When injected judiciously, they remain appropriate to inspire us and help us understand how we came to know what we know. For example, Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) was a scientist who revolutionized botany and founded plant taxonomy. As researchers who spent time in Sweden at his university, garden, home, and farm studying his life's work, via historical documents and artifacts, using accepted historiographic methods (Howell & Prevenier, 2001), we have synthesized his method of scholarship as an imitable and teachable model for the confluent integration of botanical teaching, travel, and research.

Broader Impacts:
1. This work sought to develop an accurate, adaptable, disseminatable teaching model, synthesized from history of science research; the model suggests an innovative, inspirational pedagogical approach to plant science teaching. 2. This work analyzes, interprets, and synthesizes a on-site-derived corpus of focused history of science research; the results are presented in a format that is also understandable and useful for educators and non-scientists. 3. This work offers a new, integrable, and teacher-adaptable historical research-based product for the teaching of plant science; it spans a spectrum of educational levels from 6-12, undergraduate science majors, non-science majors, to graduate students.

1 - Louisiana State University, Dept. of Educational Theory, Policy, & Practice, Ph.D. Studies in Biology Education, 223 Peabody Hall, Baton Rouge, LA, 70803, USA
2 - Mississippi State University, Dept. of Geosciences, 101-D Hilbun Hall, Mississippi State, MS, 39762-5448, USA

Keywords:
botany teaching
historical model
historiographic research
history of science
Linnaeus
plant taxonomy.

Presentation Type: Oral Paper:Papers for Sections
Session: 34
Location: 554B/Convention Center
Date: Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010
Time: 10:30 AM
Number: 34002
Abstract ID:36