Abstract
Agricultural development requires functional infrastructures, a continued assimilation of old and new technologies, and increased involvement of people who are motivated to create behavioral changes among colleagues and farmers. As educators in graduate training programs, we provide basic horticultural and scientific training. However, we often neglect training in practical farming skills, leadership or administrative skills, communication strategies, and the study of human behavior related to the acceptance of new ideas, concepts, and techniques.
The goal of this study was to assess changes in the life skill development of elementary school students participating in a 1-year school garden program. The Life Skills Inventory included statements for six constructs of life skills including teamwork, self-understanding, leadership, decision making skills, communication skills, and volunteerism. The students were divided into two treatment groups, an experimental group that participated in the garden program and a control group that did not participate in the school garden program. Students in the control group had significantly higher overall life skills scores on the pretest compared to students participating in the garden program but the scores were no longer significantly different between the groups on the posttest scores at the end of the program. In addition, there were no significant differences in the control group's pretest scores compared to their posttest scores. However, the students in the experimental group did significantly increase their overall life skills scores by 1.5 points after participating in the garden program. Two internal life skill scales were positively influenced by the garden program; “working with groups” and “self understanding.”
Graduates of horticulture curricula are expected to be able to convey technical expertise in a variety of communication and writing activities. To address the need for writing competence, writing-across-the-curriculum concepts are being applied in a variety of horticulture courses. To expand writing skills in a turfgrass management course using a job-related activity, a newsletter project was assigned to students that required the students to write two articles and produce a newsletter publication.
Abstract
Effective verbal communication is essential not only in teaching and extension, but also in research. Research results presented at meetings are often rendered ineffective due to a poor presentation or indecipherable slides (1). Recent reports in HortScience have addressed the preparation of posters, a popular means of communication at meetings (12, 13). However, although a person can “escape” a poor poster, this option is generally not available to the audience in a presented paper. Poor presentations accompanied by inadequate visuals create an even greater problem for students during lectures in the classroom. Graduate seminars, mandatory in virtually all institutions, can provide the training ground for developing effective communication skills, preparing audio-visuals, and understanding that to be meaningful a presentation must be tailored to the audience.
Capstone courses generally target students who are nearing completion of their studies, are designed to build on skills acquired in earlier courses, and emphasize realistic situations and challenges that exist in the “real world”. Specific learning goals and course objectives are found to vary across disciplines but most capstone courses provide an opportunity for students to demonstrate a range of professional competencies and communication skills. By incorporating computer simulations, case studies, or research projects, students are better able to develop critical thinking and problem solving skills, a learning goal frequently adopted following curriculum review. The goals and organization of “Quality, Ethics, and the Global Environment,” the capstone course in Horticulture at The Ohio State University will be compared to other capstone courses.
Capstone courses generally target undergraduate students who are nearing completion of their studies. They are designed to build on skills acquired in earlier courses and emphasize situations and challenges that exist in the real world. Specific learning goals and course objectives vary across disciplines and institutions, but most capstone courses provide an opportunity for students to demonstrate a range of professional competencies and communication skills. By incorporating computer simulations, case studies, or research projects, students are better able to develop critical-thinking and problem-solving skills, a learning goal frequently adopted following curriculum review. A brief overview of the development, current popularity, and widespread offering of university capstone courses is presented. The goals and organization of `Quality, Ethics, and the Global Environment,” the capstone course in the horticulture major at Ohio State Univ., is compared to other capstone courses.
Horticulture students often lack practical experience integrating information from diverse sources to solve complex real-life problems. Capstone courses seek to remedy this by giving students an opportunity to demonstrate a range of workplace skills such as teamwork, effective communication, and critical thinking. Sponsored competitions provide educators with an active-learning framework into which the goals of a capstone course can be developed. The Greenhouse of the Future competition allowed undergraduate students to conceptualize, develop, and prototype innovative greenhouse designs in a national competition venue. This article explains the guidelines of the Greenhouse of the Future competition and discusses how the competition was integrated into the capstone course Greenhouse Management.
referred to as career or soft skills, encompass an array of proficiencies critical for workplace success. Although broadly defined, professional skills include the following: effective communication, the ability to solve complex problems and think
Hispanics are becoming the main source of labor in many productive- and service-oriented businesses in the United States, and the nursery industry is one example. Employers invest much time and money into employees, making the employees their biggest investment. However, the educational needs of Hispanic employees have not been adequately addressed, and no formal educational program for Hispanic workers in the nursery industry has been implemented and tested in Ohio. This project has two objectives: 1) measure the impact of a bilingual educational program containing instruction in horticulture and instruction in life skills to a Hispanic workforce, and 2) investigate which type of training is more essential to the stabilization of the Hispanic family unit, technical horticultural training, or training in life-skills. Eight nurseries throughout Ohio were selected to participate in this project. At each of the nurseries, an average group size of 15 employees was trained. Only half of this number participated in the social skills lessons to determine differences between the group who received social skills lessons and the group who did not. Three horticultural topics were selected: basic plant structure and development, pruning, and nutrition. Forty-minute lessons in Spanish with key concepts in English were prepared with the topics mentioned. Three social skills topics were selected: meeting your and your family's needs in the United States, social support in your community, and communication. In order to measure the impact of a bilingual educational program, two tests (The Rosenberg Selfeteem and Index of Family Relationship) were applied before and after the program was performed. A course evaluation was completed by each of the participants after the program was completed.
A 200-level course at Iowa State Univ., Principles of Horticulture, has included a communication across the curriculum assignment for the past seven semesters involving ≈425 students. Each undergraduate student develops and writes an individual student newsletter on topics and for an audience of the student's choice. The semester-long project motivates students to practice a professional communication task, and teaches technical horticultural material and writing skills. The newsletters contain at least two separate articles for an intended audience, providing the students with an opportunity to learn technical information in subjects in which they are intensely interested, but may not be taught in a principles course. Drafts of the articles and newsletter project are peer-reviewed by the students to model the professional review process, provoke critical thinking, and provide students with more feedback than they would otherwise receive from the instructor alone. Additionally, peer-review facilitates writing intensive courses for the instructor who wishes to focus course activities on writing, but has limited time or resources for reviewing writing assignments. Student newsletter articles are selected to be included in quarterly department and extension newsletters, providing students with a real-world use of a communication across the curriculum assignment.