Understanding Microbial Biogeography: Instructional Materials for an Undergraduate Team Learning Activity

Overview This content includes instructor materials for an undergraduate team learning activity that was created by Dr. Natalie Vandepol and Professor Ashley Shade. for the Microbial Ecology MMG 425 course that was offered at Michigan State University in the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics. MMG 425 was an upper-level undergraduate course that had no prerequisites. If you use or modify this material, please remember to attribute by using its FigShare DOI. If there are questions or concerns, feel free to reach out to Prof. Shade (shade.ashley at gmail dot com). This content accompanies the manuscript: Is everything everywhere? A hands-on activity to engage undergraduates with key concepts in quantitative microbial biogeography By Natalie Vandepol and Ashley Shade More details about the recommended instruction and example student outcomes are provided in this manuscript. (INSERT DOI/LINK when available) These instructional materials includes 1. Appendix1_EnvironmentCards.pdf Print 1 copy and cut the cards. Each team receives 1 environment card. 2. Appendix2A_DispersalSimulationExperiment.pdf These are the student instructions for the learning activity. Each team receives 1. 3. Appendix2B_EnvironmentalGradients.pdf This grid provides the environmental niche space for each community member (unique pom phenotype, a.k.a. OTU) and is used to determine which poms survive in the habitat (provided by the Environment Card). Each team receives 1. 4. Appendix2C_OriginalSurveyDataWithoutDispersal.pdf This community taxon table (aka “OTU” Table) provides the expected distribution of the OTUs/poms in the absence of dispersal. It is to be compared to the class distributions after the activity. Each team receives 1. 5. Appendix3_StudentActivityDataSheet.pdf This is an blank sheet that students will fill in with OTU/pom abundance information given each step in the simulation experiment (random dispersal and environmental section). 6. Appendix4_StudentWorksheet.pdf This is a blank worksheet to guide students ...