| Lesson Title (Description) | Grade Level | Lesson Type |
Crocs, Then and Now
This lesson has students investigate the geographical distributions, habitats, and other features of modern crocodilians and SuperCroc. Students consider what can be learned about one species by studying the other. |
6-8 |
Classroom activity |
Interactive investigation: The arthropod story
This interactive investigation delves into the amazing world of the arthropods and examines their success and their evolutionary constraints. |
6-8 |
Web activity |
What did T. Rex Taste Like?
In this web-based module students are introduced to cladistics, which organizes living things by common ancestry and evolutionary relationships. |
6-8 |
Web activity |
Classification and Evolution
Students construct an evolutionary tree of imaginary animals (Caminalcules) to illustrate how modern classification schemes attempt to reflect evolutionary history. |
9-12 |
Classroom activity |
Evo in the news: A fish of a different color
This news brief, from February 2006, describes how a mutated zebrafish gene may help us understand human evolution and the genes underlying human skin color. Humans and zebrafish both inherited the same pigmentation gene from their common ancestor. |
9-12 |
Article |
Evo in the news: More than morphology
This news brief, from August 2006, describes recent research on T. rex, with a special focus on how paleontologists move beyond the shape of the animal's bones to learn about aspects of its life that don't fossilize very well: its physiology, sensory abilities, and population dynamics. |
9-12 |
Article |
Evo in the news: Seeing the tree for the twigs
Recent research has revealed that, in at least some ways, chimpanzees have evolved more than humans have. This news brief from May 2007 delves into this finding further and, in the process, debunks common misperceptions of human evolution. |
9-12 |
Article |
Evo in the news: The new shrew that's not
This news brief from March of 2008 describes scientists' discovery of a new mammal species, a giant elephant shrew. Though elephant shrews resemble regular shrews, recent genetic evidence suggests that elephant shrews actually sprang from a much older (and perhaps more charismatic) branch of the tree
of life - the one belonging to elephants and their relatives. |
9-12 |
Article |
Evolutionary trees and patterns in the history of life
Scientists use many different lines of evidence to reconstruct the evolutionary trees that show how species are related.
This article is located within Evolution 101. |
9-12 |
Tutorial |
Explore life on earth
This short video would make a nice, brief introduction to a more extensive discussion of the history of life and common ancestry. Using computer-generated graphics, it traces the tree of life from its roots in the very first cells up to the diverse life forms that inhabit the earth today. |
9-12 |
Video |
Interactive investigation: The arthropod story
This interactive investigation delves into the amazing world of the arthropods and examines their success and their evolutionary constraints. |
9-12 |
Web activity |
Investigating Common Descent: Formulating Explanations and Models
Students formulate explanations and models that simulate structural and biochemical data as they investigate the misconception that humans evolved from apes. |
9-12 |
Classroom activity |
It's All in Your Head: An Investigation of Human Ancestry
Students describe, measure and compare cranial casts from contemporary apes, modern humans, and fossil hominids to discover some of the similarities and differences between these forms and to see the pattern leading to modern humans. |
9-12 |
Classroom activity |
What did T. Rex Taste Like?
In this web-based module students are introduced to cladistics, which organizes living things by common ancestry and evolutionary relationships. |
9-12 |
Web activity |
