The goal of  the National Science Foundation sponsored �GK12 Connections in the Classroom:  Molecules to Muscles� (GK12) at The University of Southern Mississippi  is to improve graduate fellows' communication and teaching skills in an interdisciplinary research and education setting. Graduate fellows from chemistry, biochemistry, polymer science and biology departments work ten hours per week in local high schools to enrich science classes and laboratories through activities related to their own research. Fellows learn different approaches to communicate to non-scientific audiences and to relate research advances in a way that is relevant to high school students.  An interdisciplinary team approach is utilized to help students develop skills to effectively communicate to different target audiences.  Initiatives implemented to improve fellows' scientific communication skills include delivery of a series of presentations with specific topics to different audiences, supervised teaching sessions, videotaping of presentations with individualized feedback for improvement and developing research presentations for an audience of scientists outside their field. These and other successful communication training tools implemented will be reviewed.

Improving science communication in the high school classroom: NSF GK-12 Connections in the Classroom

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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