Meet the Research Videos

Overview

Juana Hicks Rodriguez created short "Get to Know the Research" videos to introduce K-12 students to real-world scientific research and data interpretation. Each video features a Wyoming scientist explaining their work in accessible language, showing students how data is collected, analyzed, and applied to answer a research question. The videos bridge classroom learning and current research, helping students see data as a tool for decision-making. One video is shared here, exploring aquatic ecology data.

Juana's overview of the Meet the Research video is linked HERE. Scroll down to the Resources & Links section of this page to check out other related materials.

Goals

• Introduce students to real Wyoming researchers and their work
• Scaffold an approach for students to practice analyzing data and answering real-world questions as scientists do
• Strengthen students' data literacy and critical thinking through interaction with real data
• Make data and researchers accessible to K-12 students in a bite-sized format

Implementation & Outcomes

• Designed for K-12 classrooms as short videos introducing students to real Wyoming research
• Refined a video structure to highlight a research question and include a dataset and visualizations for students to interact with and analyze
• The featured video with Tristan Blechinger explains how he uses stable isotopes to track the flow of energy through food webs

Resources & Links

• Meet the Research: Tristan Blechinger
• Check out this Meet the Scientist Post for more videos created by Juana

Contact for More Information

For more details about this program or to learn how to incorporate similar activities in your school, please reach out to the TRKE program coordinators at smtcpd@uwyo.edu.