Mark Lyford

Research Emphasis

My research area is science education.  Broadly speaking, I am interested in how different pedagogical and assessment practices impact student learning.  I am also very interested in studying different curricular approaches to attaining scientific literacy, and making connections between science and society.

Current Research Projects

• Incorporating ‘desirable difficulties' into classroom pedagogy.
• Institutional models for Scientific Literacy.

Selected Publications

Nehm, R.H., T.M. Poole, M.E. Lyford, B.E. Ewers, S.G. Hoskins, & P.J.S. Colberg, 2008.  Does the Segregation of Evolution in Biology Textbooks and Introductory Courses Reinforce Students' Faulty Mental Models of Biology and Evolution?  Evolution Education Outreach (DOI 10.10007/s12052-008-0100-5).

Jackson, S.T., J.L. Betancourt, M.E. Lyford, & S.T. Gray.  2004.  A 40,000-year woodrat-midden record of vegetational and biogeographic dynamics in northeastern Utah.  Journal of Biogeography 32: 1085-1106.

Lyford, M.E., S.T. Jackson, S.T. Gray, & R.G. Eddy.  2004.  Validating the use of woodrat (Neotoma) middens for documenting natural invasions. Journal of Biogeography 31: 1-10.

Lyford, M.E., S.T. Jackson, J.L. Betancourt, & S.T. Gray.  2003. Influence of landscape structure and climate variability on a late Holocene plant migration.  Ecological Monographs 73(4): 567-583.

Jackson, S.T., M.E. Lyford, & J.L. Betancourt.  2002.  A 4000-year record of woodland vegetation from Wind River Canyon, central Wyoming. Western North American Naturalist 62(4): 405-413.

Lyford, M.E., J.L. Betancourt, & S.T. Jackson. 2002.  Holocene vegetation and climate history of the northern Bighorn Basin, southern Montana. Quaternary Research 58: 171-181

Jackson, S.T., & M.E. Lyford.  1999.  Pollen dispersal models in Quaternary plant ecology: assumptions, parameters, and prescriptions.  Botanical Review 65(1): 39-75.