Team:CAU China/Education
Education
Through our questionnaire survey, we have found that “synthetic biology” is still a foreign concept to the public and they haven’t considered it as a future solution for global problems. Also, born and raised in cities, many people lack the basic knowledge about soil degradation. Therefore, CAU_China prioritized the social value of “arouse public awareness in synthetic biology as a solution” in our project and strived to achieve this value by education in synthetic biology and soil problems.
Our education involved different activities for audience with different ages and academic backgrounds. Here we shared our intentions, implementation and dialogues in education events, also the final materials we designed and tips for using them.
Games：Working With Genes {kindergarten}
Intentions:
For kids in kindergarten, it’s hard to make them focus and remember any biological terms, so we decided to convey some basic ideas in synthetic biology(e.g. genetics, bases, gene circuit) by games or models instead. When designing games, we tried to make their materials as easy-to-get as possible, so not only can these games be used in class by educators, but also they can be carried out by parents with kids just at home.
Implementation:
To explain the concept of genetics, we let kids leave their fingerprints by ink pad and let them observe the differences between their fingerprints and their friends’, in order to convey the idea that we can be distinguished from each other by genetic information or phenotypes. To make them understand what is responsible for this difference, we offered them a sequence of DNA with base-pairs and let them color the bases with just four colours. To further introduce the concept of gene circuit, we prepared a train model whose carriages stand for promoter, coding region and terminator in a composite circuit respectively. We encouraged kids to cut out these “carriages” and place them in right order on the railway track. During our education, kids really enjoyed those games and showed no boredom at all.
Dialogues:
We invited kids to think about difference between each of us and share their opinions on diversity and differences after comparing fingerprints. Though not related to synthetic biology, we believe this kind of moral discussion is essential in education as well, since diversity&inclusion is one of iGEM’s main values.
Materials & Tips:
We translated our final material into English for a broader use beyond China. Moreover, we specified materials needed to carry out these games and some useful tips based on our experience. Be free to view, download, and also offer your suggestions!
Fun Experiments: Life Designer and pH Games {primary school}
Intentions:
We believe kids in primary school can focus more on knowledge itself and probably will hold loads of curiosity towards science, so we decided to guide them through simple experiment or creation to satisfy their curiosity and bring a sense of achievement. In detail, we tried to build the key concept of “central dogma” for kids, which is the basis of modern biology research, and we want them to try this dogma out by designing a new life in imagination. Moreover, considering that these kids grow up in cities, we aimed to let them know the seriousness of soil degradation and improve their environmental awareness.
Implementation:
To introduce the concept of gene, we let kids observe some basic phenotypes(e.g. eyelid, dimple…) and compare these characteristics between them and their parents. Then, we introduced the central dogma by telling a story of “Worker in a Protein-Factory”. Next, we let kids draw down some combination of two creatures to introduce the idea of synthetic biology, and they were encouraged to design a new life and share how they want to make it come true. Finally, after the introduction of pH, we guided kids to test four samples we provided by pH test strips and tell us which one is saline-alkaline soil and why.
Dialogues:
We encourage kids to share their piece of design with other students about the reason they want to design this creature and possible ways to make it come true(e.g. by transferring genes). Through sharing, we found that kids really owns some inspirations we did not have and their creativity surprised us a lot. As undergraduates, we realized there’s a wider explanation and hope towards synthetic biology and sometimes we were taking this concept too serious and professional. Maybe one day there will be a “fishbird”, who knows! Besides, we encouraged kids to tell us their judgements of samples and their reasons, which promote a discussion between us of how to make a reasonable conclusion based on limited results. We also added some points to encourage kids to ask and share in the materials we designed.
Materials & Tips:
We translated our final material into English for a broader use beyond China. Moreover, we specified materials needed to carry out these games and some useful tips based on our experience. Be free to view, download, and also offer your suggestions!
Lecture: Molecular Cloning and iGEM {high school}
Intentions:
Considering students in high school have already learned molecular biology roughly, we decided to introduce them to basic synthetic biology ideas by giving a lecture. Also, we wanted to share some lab work with them to satisfy their curiosity towards real scientific research and get themselves prepared for college. We hope to encourage them to participate more into synthetic biology in their future career, or at least enjoy the way of questioning and discovery of working in STEM.
Implementation:
Collaborating with SDSZ_China, we got the chance to implement our lecture in their high school. We lead students into synthetic biology by the classic example of “golden rice”, and let them know what is engineering through the DBTL engineering cycle. Next, we introduced some basic methods in genetic engineering or molecular cloning, ranging from PCR, restriction enzyme digestion to Gibson Assembly. Instead of the detailed protocols, we focused on why we did such an experiment and what results we hoped to get. Finally we introduced our iGEM projects together with SDSZ_Chian.
Dialogues:
We arranged a Q&A time after the lecture and encourage students to share their view in synthetic biology application and we lab work. Also, as a collaboration work, we had a discussion with the high school team SDSZ_China and shared tips in consulting the company about the possibility of product formation, conducting more extensive education to popularize synthetic biology, and trying to communicate and cooperate with more teams of the same age.
Tips:
As undergraduates, we think it will be easier to carry out lectures towards high school students with the help from high school iGEM teams. We think the lecture will be more engaging if educators involve some fun applications and introduce projects by telling a story.
Handbook: The Basis of Synthetic Biology {adolescents}
Intentions:
Considering that audience may feel boring during long-time lecture, we compiled an easy handbook to introduce the basis of synthetic biology. In the handbook, we start from the structure of cells to the structure of genes, then we further introduced the history and principles in synthetic biology. We hope our readers can grasp the basic concept in synthetic biology after reading and added many illustrations to help them understand.
Implementation & Dialogues:
We shared the original version of our handbook with some freshmen in CAU who didn’t major in biology, and they said this handbook is pretty basic and simple to understand for non-professionals like them. They also suggested that we should cut down the length of the introduction to the gene elements, and focus more on synthetic biology principles, because they feel those terms in gene elements seem too professional and will make them confused and bored. By comparison, synthetic biology principles offered them new points of view to view biology as science and will make them feel at the frontiers of STEM. Their suggestions are truly valuable for our improvement.
Materials:
We translated our latest version of handbook into English for a broader use beyond China. Be free to view, download, and also offer your suggestions!
Lecture: Introduction of Synthetic Biology and iGEM in CAU {undergraduates major in biology}
Intentions:
For undergraduates major in biology themselves, we considered it much easier to communicate and introduce professional terms. In this lecture, we wanted to introduce synthetic biology as an interdisciplinary subject that they may choose in their future career, so we involved the engineering, principles, promising future and dangers of synthetic biology beyond history and applications. Moreover, to select future iGEMers, we shared some prize-winning iGEM projects with them to let them know what they can achieve in iGEM. We intended to enrich their biological knowledge, arouse their interest in synthetic biology, and by introducing the trend of scientific research we hoped that they can gain inspiration for their future studies.
Implementation&Dialogues:
We gave this lecture in our campus offline as a collaboration work with BUCT and SDSZ_China. With our concise and lively language, many students have shown interest in our projects and interact with us, some of which also decided to participate in iGEM in the future. Besides, we also discussed some possible ways to integrate ideas of synthetic biology into their own scientific research.
Tips:
Undergraduates may be more interested in what they can achieve in iGEM, since the chance is precious for them to design and carry out a project completely alone. We want to involve more outstanding iGEM projects in our future lectures and illustrate more on their values and designing process.
Sharing: Harvest in iGEM{undergraduates with various majors}
Intentions:
For undergraduates from various majors, we thought it would be better to focus on our experience in doing iGEM projects instead of professional knowledge. We shared the iterations of our project design and stresses the reasons for these changes, trying to convey the engineering idea in synthetic biology. In addition, we paid special attention to the human practice work we had done and tried to make them understand why interacting with society and stakeholders is an essential part in an emerging subject like synthetic biology.
Implementation& Dialogues:
Invited by the Ministry of Education, we hosted an open online sharing for undergraduates with different majors in “Online College” program, and finally got 1000+ views and had been “liked” more than 500 times. In the end of the sharing, we arranged a ten-minute Q&A time to communicate with audience, during which our audience asked about the implementation of our project, the reason to participate in iGEM, and how to handle failures in scientific research. We both shared ways to adjust ourselves while working in STEM, and encouraged each other a lot.
Tips:
For undergraduates from different schools with different majors, it is better to introduce the iGEM competition in details before sharing, since audience may misunderstand iGEM as merely a biology competition while in fact mathematics, engineering, computer science etc. also play a vital role in iGEM.
Online Discussion: A Better World with Synthetic Biology {public}
Intentions:
We aimed to introduce the joy and pleasure in synthetic biology research to the public by giving a detailed description of our projects. Besides, in order to promote the idea of “synthetic biology as a solution”, we introduced successful examples of synthetic biology implementation to make a better world. Moreover, we treasured this opportunity to give a true sense of public education and focused on saline-alkaline soil threats nowadays to raise public awareness on soil degradation.
Implementation&Dialogues:
Together with HUST-China, HUST2-China, WHU-China, we hosted this discussion online with more than 200 volunteers from the public. To enhance engagement, we added some quizzes in the discussion that audience could give possible answers and earn little gifts. Besides ordinary Q&A time, to promote mutual learning, we set up a chat group on WeChat where audience are free to ask questions before or after the online discussion. We received many positive feedbacks from this chat group and together we discussed the implementation of synthetic biology into everyday life and what type of material did the public think useful in the education of synthetic biology.
Tips:
The public holds great curiosity and worries in synthetic biology, so it’s better to introduce more about the safety and security issues and safety examples in iGEM projects as a kind of reassurance in public education.