Association for Biology Laboratory Education

Generating a simulated dataset for Community Ecology analyses
    

Tegan N. Barry & Jenny L. McCune

Advances in Biology Laboratory Education, 2026, Volume 46

https://doi.org/10.37590/able.v46.art19

Supplemental Materials: https://doi.org/10.37590/able.v46.sup19

Abstract

During this workshop, participants learned how to set-up and run a team-based sampling exercise to generate a simulated dataset for use in third-year Community Ecology labs. The goals of these exercises are to help students learn about the structure of Community Ecology data, conduct an indoor sampling exercise regardless of weather or season, and to generate a dataset that students feel connection and ownership to. The activities in this workshop were designed to increase the approachability of large-scale data to help students confidently work up to multivariate Community Ecology analyses. Participants learned how to prepare and run the lab by taking part in the sampling and data exploration exercises and gained insight into how the simulated dataset can be used in labs throughout the term.

Keywords:  Community Ecology, data generation, simulation

University of Manitoba (2025)