Science Across the World at Aletheia University in Taiwan

Prof. Shu-Nu Chang learned about Science Across the World in November 2004 during the Young Ambassadors for Chemistry course and event Taiwan (click on report). Being a staff member at the time of the hosting university National Taiwan Normal University, Prof. Mei-Hung Chíu, the Science Across the World coordinator for Taiwan, asked Shu-Nu to organise YAC in Taipei. Says Shu-Nu: "I embraced the Science Across the World idea straightaway, wonderful idea to encourage young people to discuss science matters all over the world".

Aletheia University

After finishing her thesis (chemistry education) Dr Shu-Nu Chang got a position as assistant professor at Aletheia University in Tamsui (located in Taipei County), where she teaches Introduction to Natural Science to non-science majors for promoting scientific literacy and awareness of sustainable development issues. Last year she worked with 78 students (Theology and English major) in groups of 12. The Science Across the World programme is developed for school students, but in Shu-Nu's opinion certain topics are very suitable to achieve this aim with her University majors.

'Renewable energy' and 'Global warming'

Shu-Nu herself downloaded the Students' Pages of 'Renewable energy' and 'Global warming' (in English) and all available example exchange forms from the Exchange Form library on the Science Across the World website. The students answered the questions in the materials and collected ideas and opinions about sustainable development.

Learning about other countries

The second activity was to get to know more about the countries of the schools that produced the example exchange forms, using and acquiring better search skill on the internet. The groups had to prepare a report and a 30 minutes presentation about their research in Taiwan and about similarities and differences with other countries. The course also offered students possibilities to practice their passive and active English.

Results

To know students’ feedback after participated into SAW activity, 13 Likert scale items were developed by Shu-Nu herself. The degree of acceptances is from “very disagree” to “very agree” and scored from 1 to 7. The items are divided into four dimensions including students’ feedback about acquisition of knowledge, improving their abilities, the feedback about global exchange and their learning interests in SAW activity. Generally speaking, non-science major participants in this study felt interested in taking part into this study and could discuss these topics related to sustainable development. The total score regarding students’ acceptance was 5.44 on average. An unexpected result found that Theology majors (5.51) enjoyed more than English majors (5.37). Shu-Nu thinks SAW activity could also benefit non-English majors’ motivation for learning English through the idea of global exchange.

Future

After introducing SAW activities to the science course, Shu-Nu will try to implement more SAW in the future. During this semester, she has asked students to present the ideas in various ways, such as role playing. This is an appreciated way to make science more enjoyable for her non-science major students.

January 2007
Text and pictures: Shu-Nu Chang and Lida Schoen