For History 97, the sophomore tutorial, students peer review each other's work. Each student writes a primary source based paper, which is based on a shared source base that all of the students have read. Students have to provide detailed written and oral feedback on each of their peers' papers. To guide their responses, the instructors provide a list of questions or points to consider. Students are to identify the argument and evaluate the extent to which it is supported by evidence, the organization of the paper, and the quality of the prose.
In EPS182, Professor Francis MacDonald's students take a spring break trip to Sicily to study the geology of the region. They later use this information to write mock geology journal articles.
During J-Term prior to Field Geology (EPS74), students live in the Mojave desert for almost three weeks to map different pieces of the area in groups. The data will eventually be compiled into a composite class map.
In Sociology 157, Dan O'Brien's students choose a topic of their choice relating to the Greater Boston Area. All assignments center around this topic, culminating in a final paper that resembles an actual science paper.
In the revision stage of their the paper, Jerusha Achterberg uses vegetables to teach students how to structure their papers so that the organization coordinates with the thesis. The idea behind this activity is to break the 5 paragraph mold students bring from high school.
For the third paper of the semester, Jerusha Achterberg has her students do small-group workshops where they read and provide feedback for each other in groups of 2-3.
In Jerusha Achterberg's first and second Expos workshops of the semester, she chooses two paper drafts from the section and all the other students read and comment on those two papers. The authors also serve as the moderators for each other's discussion.
In this activity students work together in groups or as individuals on computers to understand how we can use photometric observations of stars to discover exoplanets.
