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The fate of Persistent Organic Pollutants
09/23/2010 | Carla Lauter, ODYSEA LLC (Ocean Systems)
Tags: ROLE Model webinar, Persistent Organic Pollutants, Concept Mapping, 09.22.10 webinar

With an audience of educators from 20 states, last night's webinar was to our largest audience ever. A huge thank-you to the presenters for their engaging presentations and insights!

POPs around the world
Scientist and freshman chemistry teacher Penny Vlahos presented her concept map about Persistent Organic Pollutants (also known as POPs) last night - and shared some of the hard truths about some of the man-made chemicals that travel around the globe. These POPs can be anything from pesticides to cosmetics, flame-retardant sprays or packing materials - and have been used for a variety of purposes until they (or the chemicals that they break down into) were found to be toxic.

Penny's map
Concept map created by Dr. Penny Vlahos to describe Persistent Organic Pollutants for the 9/22/10 webinar. (Click to enlarge)

Penny gave us a great overview of some of the sources, the transport paths that these pollutants can take to enter coastal ecosystems. During the question and answer session, she also offered suggestions for teachers who want to discuss these compounds in their schools, and detailed her proposed work with schools monitoring chemicals in the oil spill.

The right connections
Sue Klemmer, high school teacher from Camden, ME was inspired to use concept mapping when she was taking a graduate course, and first read "Learning How To Learn" by Novak and Gowin. She shared some of the teaching strategies she uses with her students when they are learning to concept map. She uses concept mapping to increase their reading comprehension - also helping them to understand both the content and their own learning. She showed several example maps that illustrate misconceptions and allow her to know what topics she needs to spend more time on. Sue also shared the rubrics that she uses to evaluate student concept maps. These resources are available on her teaching wiki. Download Sue's slides here (Power Point, 923 KB).



Map created by Penny Vlahos for 9-22-10 webinar
Want to keep a copy of the map presented in this webinar?
  • Download a pdf copy of this map here (PDF, 229 KB)
  • To view the interactive version of this map, click here.
When asked for a visitor's password, choose ROLEModel as the username and 2010 as the password.
  • To share the map to your own profile, login to the Concept Map Builder with the username of ROLEModel and the password 2010.
Open the map and click "share" to send a copy of the map to yourself (if you have already registered for a COSEE profile.)

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