Hooks for Four‐Dimensional Ecology Education ( 4DEE ) teaching with differing audiences of nonmajors

Abstract Nonmajors (i.e., undergraduate students not majoring in the natural sciences) constitute a majority of United States college graduates and are a large potential audience for courses with ecology content. However, nonmajors may be unmotivated to learn about ecology because they perceive it to be uninteresting and irrelevant to their everyday lives or career goals. Although the Four‐Dimensional Ecology Education (4DEE) framework can be adapted for nonmajors courses as a starting point to improve student engagement, we suggest that nonmajors ecology instructors also use ecology hooks as effective gateways to 4DEE that will motivate and deepen student learning. Selecting and developing meaningful ecology hooks requires knowing your audience, including their chosen majors. In this way, the audience should inform the hook, and the hook then helps to propel the audience's learning. In addition to being relevant to the audience, ecology hooks should be connected to student learning outcomes and multiple dimensions of 4DEE and supportive of inclusive classroom goals. We discuss how to identify and develop authentic ecology hooks and integrate them into 4DEE‐aligned courses to engage students. For heterogeneous audiences that comprise a mix of many different majors, we suggest the use of three types of universal ecology hooks: “everyday,” “local,” and “wow” hooks. For specialized audiences of a single major or similar majors, we suggest the additional use of “major‐specific” ecology hooks and provide examples for health professions, business, and visual and performing art majors. Although ecology hooks alone are unlikely to be a panacea for all challenges of engaging nonmajors, they are an important teaching tool that can bring new relevance, energy, creativity, thought‐provoking ideas, and connections into nonmajors courses.