The 2012 ASHS Annual Conference

New forms of communication and media are used to transfer horticultural information such as internet-based videos. A project was assigned to students in an introductory level horticultural sciences course to develop and display videos as a means of learning and communicating horticulture.  The objectives of the project assignment were three-fold; 1) to have students learn specific horticulture information and/or technology of their interest, 2) to translate that information into a consumer level video product, and 3) to have students work in collaboration to accomplish a task and achieve a goal.  Students were self-assigned into groups of three to five and given the assignment to work collaboratively to plan, develop and produce a three to six minute self-operating video on a horticultural topic.  A list of twenty five example topics was given to each group and each group self-selected the topic.  Benchmarks for project achievement were submissions of topic selection, key references to be used in project development, project outline, a script for the project, and a finished project.  Students had five weeks to complete the task and were given three 50-minute class periods in which to work on projects. Out-of-class activity was required to complete projects.  All video projects were submitted and viewed by the class.  The projects were evaluated within each team assessing group participation and contribution to project completion.  Projects were evaluated by the class rating videos, and selecting videos for awards in several categories including best production, most useful information, and best visual presentation.  Evaluations indicated students enjoyed the nature of the project and enjoyed viewing class projects.  Student’s self-evaluations indicated students learned information about their topic area in the development and production of the video.  Students indicated that, overall, this was a valuable learning experience.