4D: Gallery of Teaching Modules and Student Work
Writing in the Sciences: Popular Science Article using Adobe InDesign
This learning module teaches students how scientific writing and research work by immersing them in the research, writing, and publication of a scientific article for publication for a popular, lay audience. The students work together to compile a collection of popular magazine-style scientific articles for a magazine like Popular Science or Scientific American. Each student contributes an article to the compilation. The primary goal and outcome of the project is for the students to deepen their understanding of how science and scientific communication works. As such, Adobe InDesign is a means to the end of disciplinary learning and not the end itself. However, students are likely to develop their skills with InDesign quite effectively along the way, because they are immersed in an experiential learning project, potentially with a real, public audience for their work.