The community response to
@Chris Carr's call for ideas for delivering lessons around the topic of evolution has been fantastic! Thanks go out to
@Claire Ruthven,
@Mandy Quinton @Paulina Guerrero Gutiérrez,
@Matthew King,
@Sara Falcone and
@Rachel Collins and
@Mary Howell (SORRY if I have missed anyone!)
There have been some great examples of strategies to use, for example this from
@Paulina Guerrero Gutiérrez
- Try to create links between students experiences and the theory. For example, I always start the topic of natural selection with the following question: "What is the MAXIMUM number of children that is biologically possible for a human couple to have? (Assume single births. Show your work.) Would you want to have that many children? Why/why not?" This gets students really interested, and then, when they come up with numbers in the thirties and forties, they immediately start talking about the limiting resources (money, space in their house, clothes, etc) and why people these days wouldn't want to reproduce that much.
Also some super resources such as an A-Level adapted version of the Clippy Island model by
@Matthew King which really perked the interest of our biology specialist @Mary Howell.
Thanks everyone for your contributions, sharing great practice and resources!
It's never too late to contribute to a discussion, if you have any ideas for effective delivery of the evolution topic you can join the discussion here.