Tuesday
08 JAN 2019

Communicating science: Why scientific literacy matters

• Course overview and introductions
• Challenges of science communication
• Science in a box: constructing and communicating scientific models
• Setting up your electronic portfolio
• Introduction to Assignment #0

Readings and viewings will be previewed in class

Thursday
10 JAN 2019

Science through the ages: How we arrived at the scientific method and why it works

• Science vs. 'science' from Aristotle to Einstein
• Discourse communities, peer review, and public perceptions of scientific inquiry
• Some basic scientific principles: Occam's Razor, falsifiability, blinds and controls, randomization, correlations, hypothesis testing, false positives and negatives
• Categorizing gray areas: "weird" information and scientific anomalies

Tuesday
15 JAN 2019

Scientism, pathological science, pseudoscience, and fraud: scientific mis/disinformation

• The impulse to scientific sensationalism: handling the public's crave for cures and miracles
• Popular portrayals of scientists as geniuses, saints, and sinners: humanizing science by humanizing scientists
• Scientism, pathological science, pseudoscience, and fraud: avoiding scientific misinterpretation and misinformation
• Predatory science publishing
• Common scientific forms and genres
• Introduction to Assignment #1
• Introduction to Assignment #2

Beall's List of Standalone Predatory Journals (archival site)

Emil Karlsson's web page on Jeffrey Beall (2018 JAN 16)

Thursday
17 JAN 2019

Scientific storytelling and 21st century audiences

• APT: audience, purpose and tone
• Scientific storytelling in fiction and non-fiction
• Scientific memes
• Introduction to Assignment #3

Tuesday
22 JAN 2019

Fjording gulfs in scientific understanding

• Metaphors and analogies
• Scaling strategies
• Assessing conceptual complexity
• Scientific phrases and acronyms
• Priming/framing of scientific concepts
• Explanatory heuristics and schemata
• Introduction to Assignment #4

Due:

Assignment #0

Thursday
24 JAN 2019

What brain science says about science

• Cognitive dissonance
• Thought (gedanken) experiments
• Left-brain / right-brain approaches to communicating scientific concepts
• Multimodal learning: visual; auditory; tactile / hands-on
• Dealing with common learning impairments
• Introduction to Assignment #5

Due:

Assisgnment #1

Tuesday
29 JAN 2019

Warning—graphic content!: Using our eyes to enhance, rather than confound, scientific understanding

• Visual communication of science
• Graphical formats for communicating scientific ideas
• Infographics
• Integrating graphics with text
• Photography tips
• Introduction to Assignment #6

Due:

Assignment #2

Assignment #4

Thursday
31 JAN 2019

Visual rendering of scientific concepts

• The napkin as canvas: representing STEM ideas on the spot
• Basics of scientific concept rendering
• Perspective, scale, and proportion
• Translating from sketches to finished work
• Introduction to Assignment #7

NOTE: Today, we will hone basic graphics skills. Come to class with a crude sketch prepared of a scientific concept or apparatus you wish to render. We will build on that.

Tuesday
05 FEB 2019

Numbers and quantitative representation: making your scientific messages count

• How to talk about numbers in text
• Raw number presentation formats: tables and matrices
• Common misinterpretations of statistical data; avoiding numeric inuendo
• Formal textual equation embedment and formatting in text
• Plots, scattergrams, graphs, histograms. bar charts and pie charts
• Introduction to Assignment #8
  

Due:

Assignment #3

Thursday
07 FEB 2019

Improving audience numeracy

• Dealing with equations and lay audience math anxiety
• Novel ways of displaying numeric information
• Quantitative infographics
• Strategies for time-space scaling

Tuesday
12 FEB 2019

Oral communication and live presentations of scientific material

• Oral communications: what your voice says about science that your keyboard doesn't
• Public speaking basics
• Using visuals to enhance live presentations
• Managing a presentation Q&A session
• Designing audience handouts
• Introduction to Assignment #9

Due:

Assignment #5

Thursday
14 FEB 2019

Mastering the scientific interview

• Preparation for interviews
• Ethical and legal requirements of recorded interviews
• Directing and redirecting of questions
• What to do when things go wrong
• Transcribing and editing an interview

Stormy waters: navigating and communicating controversial science

• Framing, priming and narrative control in science communication
• Legacy scientific debates and "third rail" controversies: evolution, abortive drugs, global climate change
• Responding to abuses of science to advance political-economic agendas
  
• Salvaging misconceptions and misinterpretations of science
• Agreeing to disagree: how to maintain public discourse on disagreeable topics

Tuesday
19 FEB 2019

Communicating within the commercial scientific space

• Intellectual property (IP) basics: copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets
• Interactive science: museums and touch tanks

Due:

Assignment #6

Thursday
21 MAR 2019

Interactive workshop: designing a hands-on science museum exhibit

NOTE: During this in-class workshop we will use science communication principles to design interactive museum exhibits.

Due:

Assignment #7

Tuesday
26 FEB 2019

Visiting lecture: Roscoe Loetzerich, Base Archaeologist, Vandenberg AFB

"Science Communication and Public Perceptions of Archaeology"

Thursday
28 FEB 2019

Tour of UCSB REEF (Research Experience & Education Facility)

NOTE: We will meet at the REEF facility at 11:00 a.m. instead of our regular classroom. (UCSB map)

Tuesday
05 MAR 2019

Discussion and debrief of REEF tour and interactive science

Thursday
07 MAR 2019

Sounding science

Demonstration and practice with Audacity software

Sound recording basics; photo basics

Tuesday
12 MAR 2019

Preliminary peer reviews of electronic portfolios to date

Due:

Assignment #8

Select a few assignments on your electronic portfolio to show to class peers.

Thursday
14 MAR 2019

Portfolio Reviews

• Student peer reviews of ePortfolios
• Q&A

NOTE: Students will vote and award prizes to ePortfolio projects using the following criteria:

• Best prose composition
• Best graphics(s)
• Best quantitative presentation(s)
• Best metaphor or analogy to explain a scientific concept

Course reflection and discussion

Course/instructor evaluation