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Teresa MacDonald
Director of Education
Public Education
Biodiversity Institute

Contact Information

Office Phone: 
785.864.2371
Email: 
tmacd@ku.edu
Building: 
Dyche Hall

Teresa MacDonald is Director of Education at the KU Natural History Museum. She holds a bachelor of arts, honors, degree in physical anthropology and a master of science in vertebrate paleontology. She has more than twenty years of science teaching experience in museums, science centers, universities and schools from kindergarten to college level on three continents. Teresa is also involved in several National Science Foundation grant-funded projects, including serving as the outreach director for Quarked! Adventures in the Subatomic Universe, a physics education project, and was the Principal Investigator for the Understanding the Tree of Life project.

Selected Papers
MacDonald, T. and Wiley, E.O. (2012). Communicating phylogeny: Evolutionary tree diagrams in museums. Evolution Education and Outreach, 5:14-28. DOI 10.1007/s12052-012-0387-0. (KU ScholarWorks http://hdl.handle.net/1808/9307).

MacDonald, T., and Bean, A. (2011). Adventures in the Subatomic Universe: An exploratory study of a scientist-museum physics education project. Public Understanding of Science, 20(6): 846-862.

MacDonald, T. (2010). Communicating Phylogeny: Evolutionary tree diagrams in museums. Paper presented at NARST (National Association for Research in Science Teaching) annual conference, Philadelphia, PA, March.

MacDonald, T., and Bean, A. (2009). Quarked! Adventures in physics education. The Physics Teacher, 47:38-41.

 

Recent Blog Posts

May 20, 2011
A recent Science article reported by the New York Times presented the findings...
February 11, 2011
  Students hunt for insects in a science camp put on by the Natural...

Informal Science Education

Research Projects

Active Projects

Exploring the Euteleost Tree of Life represents the education and outreach of the Euteleost Tree of Life research grant (BI PI: Wiley), which consists of a scientist profile, curriculum activity and web material. Scientist profile. EToL PI and...
Active
University of Kansas Natural History Museum
General Project
Web site
Adventures at Nanoscale: Superconductivity is an NSF CRPA (Communicating Research to Public Audiences) project which seeks to communicate current research at...
Active
University of Kansas Natural History Museum
General Project
The Nanotechnology for Renewable energy (#EPS-90903806) project is part of the NSF EPSCoR Phase VI: Climate Change and Energy grant. The goal of the K-12 outreach is to communicate core ideas and concepts related to nanoscale and...
Active
University of Kansas Natural History Museum
General Project
Web site
Quarked!™ is a collaborative physics education project at the University of Kansas that provides...
Active
University of Kansas Natural History Museum
General Project
Web site

Completed Projects

Understanding the Tree of Life (UToL) is a collaboration that brought together learning researchers, educators, and informal education partners (natural history museums, science centers, zoos & aquariums) to explore how people understand and...
Completed
University of Kansas Natural History Museum
General Project
Web site
Collaborators: 

Alice Bean - Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Kansas

Judy Wu - Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Kansas

May 20, 2011

A recent Science article reported by the New York Times presented the findings of a study that compared the impact of a traditional lecture format to a more interactive approach to teaching in a large college physics class. The latter approach included soliciting students’ ideas and providing feedback, small group work, and in-class activities — and resulted in improved student learning, attendance and engagement.
The foundation of the ‘deliberate practice’ model and related ideas in educational research is that learners have their own ideas about how the world works, and that we can support learning by actively exploring and connecting with these existing ideas through meaningful, engaging experiences. In short, students are active participants in their learning.

Aquatic Biology summer camp

On a small scale, our Aquatic Biology summer camp could be viewed through the lens of ‘deliberate practice.’ It involves small group activities and provides opportunities for participants to practice their knowledge and skills. Youth are introduced to basic ideas about water quality and assessment techniques, exploring these techniques through a series of simple experiments, and then collecting and recording data in the field. We then discuss our findings.

The hitch with a more interactive and engaged approach is that it takes a lot of time. Consciously and deliberately designing your teaching around such strategies at any level is time-consuming, although it gets easier with experience. For example, creating field journals that are accessible and usable by 8 to 11 years olds takes thought and planning.

Many years ago as a graduate student in Canada I was involved with a Women in Science organization which conducted a study on the impact of a ‘female-friendly’ introductory college chemistry curriculum which included in-class activities and problem-solving with real-world connections. The result — test performance was on par with other sections, but student interest and motivation were significantly higher in the study group. It turned out that such strategies were not only ‘female-friendly’, but were in fact ‘student-friendly.’

An important finding from the Science study and others is that more engaging teaching strategies not only improve traditionally tested outcomes but also enhance student confidence, interest and motivation — critical factors in thinking about life-long learning and career choices. They can also support informed decision making about science/technology issues.

Museums and other informal science institutions are familiar with this approach as they seek to connect with visitors through their exhibits and programming. Such experiences support factual and conceptual understanding, but perhaps most powerfully influence affective elements related to learning such as engagement and motivation about science. Enhancing content knowledge and understanding as well as supporting an interest in science without the incentive (or disincentive) of a test is a powerful impact!

In a time with mounting pressures and decreasing resources, it can seem daunting to attempt such a course. But there are resources to help. KU’s Center for Teaching Excellence provides resources and workshops to support and enhance faculty teaching. A surprising success story comes from Quarked! Adventures in the Subatomic Universe, a collaborative KU physics education project that includes a website with videos and games. Originally targeted at youth 7 to 12, teachers and the general public, several physics faculty have found it useful for their classes to provide an overall conceptual framework for particle physics and the mechanisms involved.

Thoughtfully planned and informed learning experiences are time-consuming, but well worth it and become easier with time and practice. If a job is worth doing, it is worth doing well.

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February 11, 2011
  Students hunt for insects in a science camp put on by the Natural History Museum   A recent New York...

From the Biodiversity Insitute blog

May 10, 2012
After a fast paced semester, Stop Day is an exclamation point between formal classes and exams. In spring, exam week is followed by another exclamation point: Graduation weekend. This is a...
April 27, 2012
The end of the semester is approaching fast, with finals just around the corner. Everyone in the lab has made significant strides this semester. Choru passed his comprehensive exams and is now ABD....
March 27, 2012
KU Entomology has enjoyed a long tradition of weekly lunch talks given by resident entomologists and visiting colleagues. This spring, I am handling the speaker schedule, which has been a piece of...
March 20, 2012
What an exciting day to participate in the installation of specimens and other objects in the upcoming exhibition, "39 Trails: Research in the Peruvian Amazon", curated by Dr. Stephen...
March 5, 2012
A few days ago, I arrived in Suriname for my second expedition of the year. I am working with some of the good folks at the National Zoological Collection of Suriname, including mentoring a student...
March 1, 2012
A skull of a Smilodon californicus exhibited at the KU Natural History Museum, one of largest such skulls ever found, caught the eye of Lawrence residents George and Mary Ann Brenner. The Brenners...
January 28, 2012
 Greetings from San Carlos del Zulia, Venezuela. I'm a bit over a week into my first expedition of the year--this one to continue our aquatic insect survey efforts in Venezuela. We've spent he...
January 16, 2012
It is the day before classes begin, and I start teaching Intro Systematics (with Dr. Mark Holder and TA Taro Eldredge). Quite exciting to see the 45+ names of enrolled students, review my lecture,...
January 3, 2012
2011 featured pernicious political posturing over what we know and how we discover it. Florida Gov. Rick Scott told the state’s universities that they should be educating students in areas...
December 19, 2011
Snowy owls - known to Harry Potter fans and birders alike - are making an appearance in Kansas and Missouri this fall and winter. The owls, which reside most of the year in Canadian tundra and arctic...
April 3, 2012

Sometimes things are so small, they’re quite hard to envision — especially for kids. For instance, nanotechnology deals with objects sized between one and one thousand billionths of a meter.

Now, that’s small.

August 3, 2011

Most young people have chatted on a cell phone, but how many of them know how energy relates to matter to make that phone call possible?

Now, researchers and educators at the University of Kansas are producing an animated video for upper elementary and middle school-aged youth to boost their understanding of superconductors and nanotechnology.

The project, funded by a $150,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, is led by KU physics professors Judy Wu and Alice Bean, along with Teresa MacDonald, director of education at the KU Natural History Museum.

November 2, 2010

What do you really know about matter? You know, the bits of stuff that make the world what it is.

For those who are curious about what those bits are made of, and how they comprise everything, the University of Kansas Natural History Museum is providing the opportunity to explore the basics of matter.