Most of the students in Professor Dennis McLaughlin’s course 1.74 Land, Water, Food, and Climate come to it with established opinions on some very controversial topics: whether GMOs are safe, whether climate change is real (and really human-induced), whether organic agriculture is preferable to conventional agriculture, and whether it’s better for land to be worked by individual farmers or by larger corporations. Dealing with topics like these in an introductory graduate-level class can be challenging. You have to train students to read the scientific literature so that they can evaluate the facts on both sides of an issue. But you also have to strike a balance between those concrete facts and the intangible social values that enter into debates on sensitive topics. In this episode, Professor McLaughlin describes his approach to those two challenges in teaching 1.74; he also explains how a diversity of backgrounds among the students in the class enriches class discussion, and he describes what he sees as the teacher’s role: to adjust and when necessary reframe the terms of discussion, while still allowing students the freedom to explore the ramifications of their ideas. Relevant Resources: MIT OpenCourseWare https://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=shownotes&utm_campaign=chalkradio&utm_term=s3e4 The OCW Educator Portal https://ocw.mit.edu/educator?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=shownotes&utm_campaign=chalkradio&utm_term=s3e4 Share your teaching ideas and insights with Dennis McLaughlin https://forms.gle/XBwUwqn35abSdjNs8 Professor McLaughlin’s course on OCW https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/civil-and-environmental-engineering/1-74-land-water-food-and-climate-fall-2020/ utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=shownotes&utm_campaign=chalkradio&utm_term=s3e4 Professor McLaughlin’s faculty page https://cgcs.mit.edu/people/mclaughlin-dennis Other environment courses on OCW https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/environment-courses/ utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=shownotes&utm_campaign=chalkradio&utm_term=s3e4 The MIT Climate Portal https://climate.mit.edu/ Connect with Curt Newton at LinkedIn or Twitter https://www.linkedin.com/in/curt-newton-309266/ https://twitter.com/qwertnewto Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions https://www.sessions.blue/ Connect with Us If you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517 On our site https://ocw.mit.edu/about/contactus/ On Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MITOCW/ On Twitter https://twitter.com/MITOCW?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor On Instagram https://www.instagram.com/accounts/login/ Stay Current Subscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. https://ocw.mit.edu/subscribe/index.htm?utm_source=header Support OCW If you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep those programs going! https://giving.mit.edu/give/to/ocw/?%20https://giving.mit.edu/give/to/ocw/?utm_source=ocw&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=donatehttps://giving.mit.edu/give/to/ocw/?%20https://giving.mit.edu/give/to/ocw/?utm_source=ocw&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=donate Credits Sarah Hansen, host and producer (https://twitter.com/learning_sarah) Brett Paci, producer (https://twitter.com/Brett_Paci) Dave Lishansky, producer (https://twitter.com/DaveResonates) Script writing assistance by Nidhi Shastri Show notes by Peter Chipman