Plant-edders:
Though I may be in the minority, I'm going to chime in here with a dissenting
opinion on the usefulness of plant terminology. While I agree that we should
avoid excessive terminology, especially for non-majors and introductory
students, because it can turn them off, I also have to agree with Kathleen
Archer that at least our upper division students should develop a reasonable
vocabulary of botanical terminology. Rather than "unnecessary classicism" I
think of it as economy of language. Like it or not, when students read the
primary literature they will encounter these terms and, therefore, should have a
good working vocabulary. So I have students learn commonly used botanical
terms, just as I require them to learn the scientific names of the families and
genera they encounter in Plant Systematics. I think it helps them comunicate
with clarity.
I try to help ease the pain of learning lots of new terms (and scientific names)
by accompanying them with their etymology the first time I use them. By doing
this, students learn many root words, and subsequently can often figure out what
new words mean.
For example: monoecious and dioecious can be broken down into mono = one,
di = two, and oecious (from "oikos") = house or home, and Lithospermum means
(roughly) rock seed.
I tell students that a bonus payoff for learning all these Greek and Latin roots
is that it can help them get a good score on the vocabulary portion of their GRE
test! (something I observed myself - knowing a bunch of scientific plant names
helped me figure out the meanings of some words I hadn't encountered before)
And besides, some weird botanical terms, like circinate vernation, are just
plain fun to say!
Maybe I'm an oddball who likes language more than most, but I think we should
nurture our students in expanding their technical vocabularies.
With respect to those with whom I disagree,
Margaret
Margaret A. Kuchenreuther
Assistant Professor of Biology
Division of Science and Mathematics
University of Minnesota - Morris
Morris, MN 56267
Phone: (320) 589-6335 or -6300 (message)
FAX: (320) 589-6371
email: kuchenma at caa.mrs.umn.edu
