Wendy Holmgren
Montgomery Bell Academy
Biology, Honors Biology 

Gautam Biswas, Ph.D. -  Teachable Agents Lab 

The Teachable Agents Lab works to integrate computer science application with the disciplines of education and psychology.  Dr. Biswas and his students are interested in the design and implementation of “teachable agents” which can be used in the classroom to self-motivate students and lead to higher degrees of learning.  They have focused their application on the fields of mathematics and science.   A second element of this lab, and where my summer experience focused, is the development of computer simulations which enable the student to self-explore and manipulate a set environment of interactions.  This model provides students an opportunity to analyze cause and affect relationships and give prediction to additional perturbations. 

I had the privilege of working with an array of talented computer scientists and education specialists this summer.  Jim Segedy, Garrett Linn, Rod Roscoe, and Hogy Jeong gave instruction, advice, and encouragement as I designed and wrote the code for a computer simulation of a Sonoran desert community.  This simulation involves the independent interactions of five species, each of which continues to live only if successfully completing feeding, competition, predator-prey and reproduction actions that satisfy certain energy requirements.  The simulation’s plot lines allow the student to graphically view these relationships.  Sliders were also implemented, which in my estimation, give the simulation an invaluable component for student learning.  Students may view single interactions and next analyze the effect of either changing that species population density or adding additional species into the simulation’s community of organisms. 

The teaching module that I will introduce to my students integrates ecology and population dynamics with the engineering concept of biomimicry and sustainable design.  The simulation will directly expose students to the balance of natural systems and their inherent fragileness.  This heightened appreciation will facilitate the students’ ability to grasp the value of industry and urban mimetic designs to assure protection of global resources, minimize human impact and conserve nonrenewable resources.