Undergraduate Research & Publications
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- ItemOpen AccessA Review of the Literature on Online Collaborative Learning in K- 12 and Post-Secondary Education During COVID 19(2022) Tay, Sharmaine; Friesen, SharonThe COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges to familiar instructional practices as the national and international response to a global pandemic precipitated a shift to online teaching and learning. This en masse transition offered a novel opportunity to examine the benefits and challenges of the now more widespread context of technologically mediated education and its impact on collaborative group learning. This conceptual review of the literature reports the findings on the impact of COVID-19 on collaborative learning in Education between the years 2020-2022. Twenty-nine of the 54 published articles from K-12 to post-secondary education contexts met the criteria established for this review and were included in the review. Three themes emerged from the review: 1) impacts of online learning on collaboration; 2) student responsibility; and 3) collaborative knowledge building. The literature on online learning and student responsibility described widely varied results with collaborative learning while the literature on online Knowledge Building learning environments indicated many of the issues had been anticipated and reported learning gains were maintained in the shift to online learning. Our review of the studies conducted during COVID-19 indicates a need for increased proactive intentional design to support learners in online learning environments.
- ItemOpen AccessCalgary Insect Pollinator Diversity and Native Plant Associations(2021-10-15) Vermaak, Sarah; Seal, Michaela; Ford-Sahibzada, Taylor; Summers, MindiInsects pollinate roughly 75% of Earth’s flowering plants, and while Calgary hosts a large number of diverse insect pollinators, its insect diversity and plant associations had not yet been cataloged. This study sought to document the diversity of Calgary’s insect pollinators and determine which native plants support them. We observed and combined observations of plant-pollinator relationships collected through iNaturalist (3168 observations) from 2008-2021, physical collections and observations from specific plants in 2020 (1840 observations), and observations of insects visiting flowers during transect (294 observations) and quadrat (225 observations) surveys in 2021. We compared the number and association type for 59 native plants, and nine major insect groups (flies, beetles, true bugs, wasps, solitary bees, butterflies, ants, bumble bees, and honey bees). We identified 63 families, 148 genera, and 194 species of insects. We found the greatest number of species and plant-pollinator associations for flies and solitary bees, followed by bumble bees and butterflies. We also identified ten native plants that were associated with the greatest number of major insect groups. The results of this project will aid conservation and restoration efforts by providing guidance to city planners, landscape designers, and gardeners on which plants best support our city’s pollinators.
- ItemOpen AccessThe King Can Do No Wrong: The Expulsion of the Douglasites, Intra-Party Conflict Resolution, and Dominant Party Ideological Moderation(2022-04-18) Tot, Brian Istvan; Sayers, Anthony Michael; Stewart, DavidIn 1947-1948, Premier of Alberta, Ernest Manning, expelled the rabidly anti-Semitic sect of his caucus and Government known as the Douglasites. In this purge, Manning would end up expelling numerous members of his caucus, Party (the Alberta Social Credit League), and Government, paving the way for a drastic shift in espoused socio-political rhetoric and ideology from the Party away from the anti-Semitic. Although Social Credit’s anti-Semitic roots run deep, it is the case that Premier Manning was the primary catalysing actor that set the de-facto natural law of the Party from his ascension to the premiership. When Manning said that he “condemned, repudiated, and completely dissociated” himself from the group, whether his intentions were actually grounded in his moral framework – as is hinted towards by the author – or were instead a measure of his political acumen, may perhaps only have been known by the premier himself. But, what is strongly evidence is the fact that Manning played a primary role in this dramatic shift. Without Ernest Manning, this movement ideologically was not necessarily a given, and rather, what the historical record implies is that Manning in many ways served as the primary catalyst and driving factor in this shift. My thesis considers this course of events, their socio-political implications, and grounds itself theoretically in an application of Orbell and Fougere’s intra-party conflict resolution model for understanding the dominant party ideological moderation/decay.
- ItemOpen AccessThe Mind-Gut Connection: A virtual reality education program on the relationship between the digestive system, nervous system, and microbiome.(2019-11-26) Lee, Ryan M.; Jacob, Christian; Sharkey, Keith A.The Mind-Gut Connection is a virtual reality education application on the relationship between the digestive system, nervous system, and microbiome. Together, these systems form the gut-brain axis and communicate with one another to carry out physiological processes associated with digestion. By illustrating this complex medical topic in a virtual reality environment, we have addressed the lack of accurate or comprehensive depictions of the gut-brain axis. Additionally, the use of virtual reality in education may allow for a broader audience to be exposed to this information. Learning about digestion in relation to the gut-brain axis is beneficial for everyone because of the impact our diets and lifestyles have on our physical and mental health. The use of this virtual reality program has the potential to better engage and inform the general public so that they are more aware of how our different body systems are interconnected. Not only is this program novel in addressing such a unique but important topic, it also exhibits innovation upon current virtual reality practices surrounding movement and motion sickness. The use of full-body virtual reality and a natural form of locomotion using arm swinging builds upon existing methods to improve the level of immersion and believability.
- ItemOpen AccessEthically-Justifiable Currency Fencing(2019-11) Sellers, Alexandra Y. L.Technological advances enable anyone to create digital currencies - not simply state actors - bringing currency debates out of political buildings and into everyday discussion. Digital currencies have the potential to be limited in access and used for ethical purposes but can also be manipulated and used for more nefarious purposes. My PURE-funded philosophical research involved cryptocurrency ethics literature review, defining a new use of a term (“fencing”), and examining the identified phenomenon for its ethical implications to determine if it can be ethically justified. This poster presents a short overview of my cryptocurrency ethics research.