Transcript Using science fiction to teach science, fiction, and

Using science fiction to teach
science, fiction, and
communications skills
Daniel W. Koon, Jonathan Gottschall
St. Lawrence University, Canton, NY 13617, USA
[email protected]
The two courses “Do Androids Dream of
Electric Sheep?” and “To Boldly Go” form a
year-long sequence of a science-fictionbased section of St. Lawrence University’s
First-Year Program [FYP]. The FYP is a
yearlong course required of all entering
students, which teaches communications
skills in a team-taught, multidisciplinary
setting. The course allows the instructor to
teach science -- from paleoanthropology to
astronomy -- and fiction -- from Robert
Heinlein to Philip K. Dick -- in the context of a
general education course in formal written
composition, oral presentation and academic
research.
Contents
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Composition (rhetoric)
instruction in North American
colleges & universities
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St. Lawrence Univ.’s First Year
Program [the FYP]
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Using science fiction in the FYP
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Feedback
Acknowledgements
M. Bos and B. Ladd
(whose idea I stole)
B. Ladd, J. Weeks, J. Barthelme, M. Wenner
(guest lecturers)
J. Simon, Eli S. Koon, T. Gottschall
(patient family members)
S. Horwitz
(“matchmaker”)
The First Year in North American
Colleges and Universities
Freshman Composition [“Freshman
Comp”]:
• 2 semester course
• Focus: short essays through
research paper
• Required of all incoming
students at many/most North
American institutions
• Required for most graduate
programs (medical school, etc.)
• 130 year history
St. Lawrence University’s
First Year Program [FYP]
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Instituted 1988
Equivalent to 1.5 courses per
semester for two semesters
• Required of all first year students
• Class size: 15 students / instructor
• Has a residential component
Semester 1:
• Team taught, thematic,
interdisciplinary
Semester 2:
• Single instructor, more focused
(often more specialized) theme
St. Lawrence University’s
First Year Program [FYP]
Skills component requirements
(minimum):
Semester 1:
• 2 oral presentations
• 3 short written essays (2-3 pages,
ca. 1000 words)
Semester 2:
• 2 oral presentations
• 1 research paper (10-12 pages,
ca. 5000 words) or its equivalent
Why would a science instructor
want to teach communications
skills?
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True interdisciplinary exchange with a
colleague from outside the sciences
Pedagogical development opportunity
Insight into what skills students bring
into upper level courses (lab reports,
etc.)
Develop non-conventional course
outside department
Recruit students to science
Teach science to non-majors
Meet new students one would
otherwise never meet
Familiarize yourself more closely with
student life (residential component)
SF in the FYP:
Science Fiction in the First Year
Program
Challenges and questions:
• [How] can physicist teach writing?
• Less content than regular course
• Minimal content makes a true SF
survey course unworkable. So how do
you structure the course?
• Broad audience (from diehard
“Trekkies” to the unwilling)
• Can one use the sf to inspire writing?
• Can one convey a sense of science as
a process?
• Can one convey a sense of the
speculative nature of science?
• Should one include scientific lab
projects? How?
Do androids dream of electric sheep?
(First semester)
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Instructors’ backgrounds: experimental
solid state physics; interdisciplinary
background in humanities and
evolutionary biology
Divided into 5 thematic units, including
one for students’ favorites, one to
concentrate on final project.
Three local expert guest lectures
Use of popular films, short stories, two
novels (Brave New World by Huxley
and The Inheritors by Golding),
technical readings
Do androids dream of electric sheep?
(First semester)
TOPIC
TEXT AND GUEST
LECTURES
MAJOR
ASSIGNMENTS
What is SF?
Invaders -- Kessel
Lifeline -- Heinlein
The time machine – Wells
Paper #1: 2-3 pp
What’s in
store?
(The Future)
Brave New World -Huxley
Mr. Tompkins -- Gamow
Film: Gattaca, Lathe of
heaven
And he built a crooked
house – Heinlein
Guest: Geometry of the
Universe
What’s your
favorite?
(Students’
choices)
Film: The Matrix
Film: Mars Attacks!
Radio broadcast: War of
the worlds
Paper #2: 2-3 pp
Individual oral
presentations:
‘Science fiction that
has become science
fact”
Do androids dream of electric sheep?
(First semester)
TOPIC
TEXT AND GUEST
LECTURES
What is
human?
The Inheritors -- Golding
I, Robot: Escape! -Asimov
Film: Blade runner
Guest: Neanderthals
Guest: Artificial
intelligence
What’s your
idea?
(Students’
original fiction)
None
MAJOR
ASSIGNMENTS
Group oral
presentations: 2person oral
presentation on some
science topic
Final written project:
10-12 page work of
fiction, based on
same topic.
Syllabus: http://it.stlawu.edu/%7Ekoon/
classes/FYP/androids.html
To Boldly Go: The science and fiction of
space travel, time travel, and
extraterrestrials
(Second semester)
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Course has three thematic units: space
travel, time travel, extraterrestrials.
Students write a research paper on
one technical aspect from one of these
three thematic units.
Students make three oral
presentations: one on the topic of their
research paper, one on a piece of
fiction, and one debate.
Each presentation also includes a
short essay.
Each presentation comes from a
separate thematic unit of course.
Students bear the principal
responsibility for teaching content
To Boldly Go: The science and fiction of
space travel, time travel, and
extraterrestrials
Space travel:
TECHNICAL
CONCEPTS
SELECTED FICTION
DEBATES
Generation ships
Solar sails
Wormholes
Tachyons
Warp drive
Baron v. Munchausen
Cyrano de Bergerac
Film: Contact
The wind from the sun –
Clarke
Were the
Moonwalks
faked?
Will humans
ever leave the
solar system?
Time travel:
TECHNICAL
CONCEPTS
SELECTED FICTION
DEBATES
Predestination
Gott time machines
Tipler time
machines
Chronology
protection
conjecture
Time branching and
alternate universes
Entropy and the
direction of time
Slaughterhouse V -Vonnegut
A sound of thunder -Bradbury
All you zombies -- Heinlein
All mimsy were the
borogoves -- Padgett
Counterclock world -- Dick
Fire watch -- Willis
Film: Minority Report
Will humans
ever travel
backwards
in time?
To Boldly Go: The science and fiction of
space travel, time travel, and
extraterrestrials
Extraterrestrials:
TECHNICAL
CONCEPTS
SELECTED FICTION
DEBATES
Non-carbon-based life
Panspermia
The Drake equation
Life in this solar system
Extrastellar planets
Exotic communication
Historical/Biblical
accounts of
extraterrestrials
Film: Alien
First Contact -- Leinster
The Sentinel – Clarke
Will humans
ever contact
intelligent life
from outside our
own planet?
Syllabus:
http://it.stlawu.edu/%7Ekoon/classes/
FYS/ToBoldlyGo.pdf
Student responses:
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Material seen as engaging (mostly).
Residential/social component very
successful. “Nerds” found each other.
Guest lectures, films popular.
5 of the 13 students enrolled in
upcoming second-year physics course
were in either the FYP or FYS.
Instructor team seen as separate
monodisciplinarians (e.g. The scientist
couldn’t teach us how to write, or grade
our writing)
Students report less sense of progress
in their writing than those in other FYP
sections
Looking ahead:
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Better incorporate writing instruction
Publish Web guide to teaching
composition for newcomers:
http://it.stlawu.edu/%7Ekoon/classes/
classes/FYP/TeachingCommunications.
html
Continue to rely on students to teach
content in Spring, but reduce content,
focus more on research skills
For more information:
E-mail: [email protected]
Syllabi:
http://it.stlawu.edu/%7Ekoon/classes/FYP/
androids.html,
http://it.stlawu.edu/%7Ekoon/classes/FYS/
ToBoldlyGo.pdf