Category: Teaching Materials

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Activities Teaching Materials

The Mating Game

https://online.ucpress.edu/abt/article/74/9/648/92552/The-Mating-Game-A-Classroom-Activity-for

Moore, D., Holbrook, C. T., Meadows, M. G., & Taylor, L. A. (2012). The mating game: A classroom activity for undergraduates that explores the evolutionary basis of sex roles. The American Biology Teacher, 74(9), 648–651. https://doi.org/10.1525/abt.2012.74.9.9

A simulation in which all students are assigned a sex (male or female), corresponding paper gametes (4 large eggs or 48 small sperm), and a quality score. Students then mingle in an assigned breeding area until they can find a partner to mate with. Each mating and the offspring produced are then recorded in a spreadsheet that is reviewed at the end of the activity. 

The source materials provide a lesson plan with discussion questions, printout of paper gametes, and spreadsheet.

Class size – 36 (could work with larger class)

Required Materials – Paper gametes, headbands or name tags with assigned sex and quality, shared spreadsheet to record data

Estimated time – 60 min

Instructor notes and adaptation – I used name tags that clip onto the student’s clothing as a marker of assigned sex and quality instead of paper headbands. The quality values of each sex should be normally distributed which is hard to pre-determine since the number of students that attend class can vary.

Course content area – Sexual Selection

Course – Evolution & Behavior (100 level)

Campus – Hunter College

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Activities Teaching Materials

A Quick and Simple Natural Selection Role Play

Butler, K. J. 2021. A quick and simple natural selection role play. CourseSource. https://doi.org/10.24918/cs.2021.10

https://qubeshub.org/community/groups/coursesource/publications?id=2717&tab_active=about&v=1

Role play game in which students act as a population of living organisms (rabbits) with different versions of a trait (running speed) that are being selected for (fox predation). Over multiple generations with selection, students see the loss of the less adaptive versions of the trait (slow and medium running speed) and fixation of the most adaptive version of the trait (fast running speed).

The source materials provide LOs, lesson plan, slides, questions/answers

Class size – 50; works best with class of 20-30 students. With 50 students 4 students assisted in counting, disseminating, and collecting cards, and identifying individuals to be selected against (predators)

Required Materials – Note cards to indicate version of trait

Estimated time – 20-30 min

Instructor notes and adaptation – I added a homework assignment to give the students credit for participating and for learning the major objectives of the lesson (located in Google drive folder – LINK)

Course content area – Natural Selection

Course – Evolution & Behavior (100 level)

Campus – Hunter College

Categories
Activities Teaching Materials

Exploring Genetic Drift with Tuco tucos

Hsu, J., Imad, M., & Wilson, K.M. 2019. Furry with a chance of evolution: Exploring genetic drift with tuco tucos. CourseSource. https://doi.org/10.24918/cs.2019.17

https://qubeshub.org/community/groups/coursesource/publications?id=2633&v=1

A simulation-based activity in which students work in small groups to select generations from an existing population – students record their group data for a large, medium, and small population – then the class reviews the data of all groups to show the overall effects of genetic drift on different size populations. Provides concrete simulation of sampling error – helps students to understand how random chance can impact allelic diversity.

The article and materials posted provide LOs, lesson plan, clicker questions

Class size – 50 (could work with larger class)

Required Materials – Poker chips, paper cups

Estimated time – 40-60 min

Instructor notes and adaptation – The original activity recommended using 2 different types of beans that were the same size. I struggled to find beans that were equivalent in size and this ultimately affected the outcome.

Because some of the desks are sloped and deskspace is limited I provided a plastic cup that students could place their bean population in and then randomly select their next generation from the cup. As students selected the beans from the cups they were more likely to select the larger beans which shifted to the top of the cup. While this affected the results the activity was still effective. Regardless, I will be using poker chips in the future.

While many students were able to grasp the overall concept (smaller populations more affected by genetic drift), some still struggled to understand random sampling. I recommend including additional examples and demonstrations (online simulator – https://www.whfreeman.com/BrainHoney/Resource/6716/SitebuilderUploads/Hillis2e/Student%20Resources/Animated%20Tutorials/pol2e_at_1502_genetic_drift_simulation/pol2e_at_1502_genetic_drift_simulation.html#).

I used a shared spreadsheet so the groups could add their data and then we could view it as a class. The spreadsheet and the follow-up assignment I used are included in the shared Google folder (accessible to verified users).

Course content area –Population Genetics & Mechanisms of Evolution – Genetic drift, mutation, gene flow, Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium

Course – Evolution & Behavior (100 level)

Campus – Hunter College