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Found 56 resources:
Mecanismos: Los procesos de la evolución
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Tutorial
Time: Varies
Overview
Aprende sobre los procesos básicos que han moldeado la vida y producido su asombrosa diversidad.
Este artículo se encuentra en Evolución 101.
Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium According to Hoyle
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- Cronkite, Donald
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: One class period
Overview
Students achieve an understanding of the Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium by using decks of playing cards without recourse to algebra.
Stickleback Evolution Virtual Lab
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Online activity or lab
Time: 3 hours
Overview
This virtual lab teaches skills of data collection and analysis to study evolutionary processes using stickleback fish and fossil specimens.
Relevance of evolution: Conservation
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Article
Time: 30-40 minutes
Overview
Explore just a few of the many cases in which evolutionary theory helps us form conservation strategies.
Relevance of evolution: Agriculture
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Article
Time: 20-30 minutes
Overview
Explore just a few of the many cases in which evolutionary theory helps us secure and improve the world's crops. Genetic diversity, disease resistance and pest control are highlighted.
Problem-based discussion: Simulations of genetic drift
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
Time: 2-20 minutes
Overview
This set of five PowerPoint slides featuring questions for problem-based discussion (i.e., open-ended questions that engage students with each other and with course material) can be easily incorporated into lectures on genetic drift.
Problem-based discussion: Population genetics calculations and Hardy Weinberg
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
Time: 5-20 minutes
Overview
This set of two PowerPoint slides featuring questions for problem-based discussion (i.e., open-ended questions that engage students with each other and with course material) can be easily incorporated into lectures on populations genetics.
Predicting evolutionary relationships
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- NOVA
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 1 hour
Overview
Students compare the sequence of amino acids in a gene shared between humans and six other organisms and infer evolutionary relationships among the species.
Population genetics, selection, and evolution
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Two to three 50-minute class periods
Overview
This hands-on activity, used in conjunction with a short film, teaches students about population genetics, the Hardy-Weinberg principle, and how natural selection alters the frequency distribution of heritable traits. It
Population genetics slide set
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
Time: 2 minutes
Overview
This set of two PowerPoint slides featuring personal response questions (i.e., multiple choice questions that can be used with "clicker" technology) can be incorporated into lectures on the mechanisms of evolution in order to actively engage students in thinking about evolution.
Natural selection and evolution of rock pocket mouse populations
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 50 minutes
Overview
This lesson serves as an extension to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute short film The Making of the Fittest: Natural Selection and Adaptation. It provides an opportunity for students to analyze amino acid data and draw conclusions about the evolution of coat-color phenotypes in the rock pocket mouse.
The Natural Selection Game
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Gendron, Robert
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 1 to 2 class periods
Overview
This is a board game that simulates natural selection. It is suitable for an introductory biology class and for more advanced classes where you could go into more detail on important principles such as the role of variation and mutation.
Molecular genetics of color mutations in rock pocket mice
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 50 minutes
Overview
This lesson requires students to transcribe and translate portions of the wild-type and mutant rock pocket mouse Mc1r genes and compare sequences to identify the locations and types of mutations responsible for the coat color variation described in a short film.
The Making of the Fittest: Natural Selection and Adaption
Grade Level(s):
- 6-8
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Video
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
This 10-minute film describes the research of Dr. Michael Nachman and colleagues, whose work in the field and in the lab has documented and quantified physical and genetic evolutionary changes in rock pocket mouse populations.
Mechanisms of evolution slide set
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
Time: 2 minutes
Overview
This set of three PowerPoint slides featuring personal response questions (i.e., multiple choice questions that can be used with "clicker" technology) can be incorporated into lectures on the mechanisms of evolution in order to actively engage students in thinking about evolution.
The genes that lie beneath: The work of Leslea Hlusko
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Research profile
Time: 40 minutes
Overview
Evolutionary biologist Leslea Hlusko's research takes her from the deserts of Ethiopia, where she hunts for hominid and primate fossils, to a baboon colony in San Antonio where she takes thousands of measurements of the primates' imposing canines. This research profile describes how the two projects are linked by a hunt for genetic variation, a key component of natural selection.
Mechanisms of evolution
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Tutorial
Time: Varies
Overview
Learn about the basic processes that have shaped life and produced its amazing diversity.
This article is located within Evolution 101.
Testing a hypothesis
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 50 minutes
Overview
Students watch a short film about natural selection in humans and answer questions on a worksheet that reinforce the evolutionary story behind malaria and sickle cell anemia prevalence.
Investigating Natural Selection
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- National Academy of Sciences
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Three class periods
Overview
Students experience one mechanism for evolution through a simulation that models the principles of natural selection and helps answer the question: How might biological change have occurred and been reinforced over time?
High altitude adaptations: The work of Emilia Huerta-Sánchez
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Research profile
Time: 30 minutes
Overview
This research profile follows statistician and population geneticist Emilia Huerta-Sánchez as she studies the adaptations that allow Tibetan highlanders to live 13,000 feet above sea level without developing altitude sickness.
Gene switches
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Two 45-minute blocks
Overview
This lesson explains how genetic switches function and their role in the process of evolution through the use of clips from the HHMI DVD, Evolution: Constant Change and Common Threads, and the construction of a model. This activity can be done as a demonstration, a student inquiry activity, or a combination of the two.
Using trees to uproot HIV: The work of Satish Pillai
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Research profile
Time: 30 minutes
Overview
This research profile follows scientist Satish Pillai as he studies the evolution of HIV within infected individuals. His research uses the tools of phylogenetics to investigate vaccine development and the possibility of curing the disease.
Evolution of human skin color
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Seven to ten 50 minute class periods
Overview
Students examine evidence for the relationship between UV and melanin in other animals; investigate the genetic basis for constitutive skin color humans; learn to test for natural selection in mouse fur color; investigate how interactions between UV and skin color in humans can affect fitness; and explore data on migrations and gene frequency to show convergent evolution of skin color.
Evolution connection: DNA replication
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
Time: 5 minutes
Overview
This short slide set explains the fidelity of DNA replication in evolutionary terms. Save the slide set to your computer to view the explanation and notes that go along with each slide.
Evolution and E. coli: Natural selection in a constant environment
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- BiteScis
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Two to three 50-minute class periods
Overview
In this reading-, writing-, and discussion-based activity, students explore bacterial evolution occurring in a stable environment, which counters the intuitive misconception that environmental change is a necessary component to natural selection. A landmark study provides the backdrop against which students can challenge their thinking about what it means for a population to evolve.
Evolution and Antibiotic Resistance
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- WGBH
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: One to three class periods
Overview
Students learn why evolution is at the heart of a world health threat by investigating the increasing problem of antibiotic resistance in such menacing diseases as tuberculosis.
Evo-devo
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Tutorial
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
Understanding the process of development can help us understand how some major evolutionary changes occurred and why others did not.
Evo in the News: When fighting leukemia, evolutionary history matters
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 30 minutes
Overview
This news brief, from December 2011, describes how evolutionary history can factor into the success of a bone marrow transplant.
Evo in the news: Toxic river means rapid evolution for one fish species
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
This news brief from March 2011 examines the genetic basis for the evolution of resistance to PCBs in the Hudson River tomcod. Though this is great for the tomcod, what might it mean for other organisms in the ecosystem?
Evo in the news: The other green (r)evolution
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
Though corn is "all-natural" in some ways, in others it is entirely manmade. This news brief from February 2007 explains the evolutionary tools that ancient humans used to engineer modern corn and the tools that scientists are using today to reconstruct corn's evolutionary history.
Evo in the news: Making sense of ancient hominin DNA
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
In March 2010 German researchers announced that they had managed to extract DNA from the 40,000 year old fossil bone from a child discovered in a Siberian cave and that it didn't match up to the known genetic sequences of either humans or Neanderthals! This news brief examines the evidence in more detail and considers what that evidence might — or might not — mean about such claims.
Variation
Grade Level(s):
- K-2
Source:
- Janulaw, Sharon
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: One period
Overview
Students look at populations of living things and identify variations in physical features.
Evo in the news: Hotspots for evolution
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 15 minutes
Overview
Why are there so many different species in the tropics? This news brief, from June 2006, suggests why: warmer weather may be linked to a quicker pace for evolution.
Evo in the news: Ghosts of epidemics past
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
HIV and malaria both constitute global health threats, respectively affecting more than 30 million and 200 million people worldwide. This news brief from October 2008 describes new research that reveals an unexpected evolutionary link between the two.
Evo in the news: Genetic variation helps rescue endangered panthers
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
In the 1990s, scientists predicted that the Florida panther would be extinct within 20 years and, in 1995, formulated a bold plan to save them. This news brief of December 2010 reports on the success of that plan which gave the panther a second lease on life by the infusion of genetic variation.
Evo in the news: Genealogy enthusiasts mine DNA for clues to evolutionary history
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 15 minutes
Overview
This news brief, from November 2007, turns an evolutionary lens on businesses that use DNA for genealogy research and, in the process, illuminates what their genetic tests really track.
Evo in the news: Gender-biased bacteria throw off an evolutionary balance
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
The percentage of southwestern whiteflies infected with Rickettsia bacteria has skyrocketed; but this is not a boon for local farmers, as the bacterium actively helps the pest spread. This news brief examines how evolutionary theory accounts for this and how we might turn it in our favor.
Evo in the news: Evolving altitude aptitude
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
This news brief from October 2010 examines new research that makes it clear that Tibetan highlanders have not just acclimated to their mountain home; evolutionary adaptations have equipped them with unique physiological mechanisms for dealing with low oxygen levels.
Evo in the news: Evolution in the fast lane?
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
Have humans, with all of our technological advances, exempted ourselves from further evolution? Perhaps not. This news brief, from February 2008, examines genetic research which suggests that human evolution may haved actually accelerated in our recent history.
Evo in the news: Evolution down under
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
This news brief, from September of 2008, describes an unusual contagious cancer currently decimating Tasmanian devil populations. Learn about the fascinating interplay between the evolution of the devils and the evolution of the disease.
Evo in the news: Evolution at the scene of the crime
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 15 minutes
Overview
This news brief, from March 2006, describes how DNA fingerprinting is being used to prosecute and exonerate the accused. DNA fingerprinting relies on the processes of mutation and genome evolution.
Evo in the News: Climate change causes loss of genetic diversity
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
This news brief, from April 2012, describes how climate change is affecting a population of chipmunks in Yosemite National Park. The chipmunks' loss of genetic variation may affect their ability to survive and their future evolutionary potential.
Evo in the news: Cheating cheetahs prosper
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 15 minutes
Overview
Biologists have discovered that female cheetahs consistently seek out multiple mates. This news brief, from July 2007, explains how the evolutionary implications of this behavior may help conservation efforts targeting these endangered animals.
Evo in the news: Antibiotic resistant bacteria at the meat counter
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
This news brief from May 2013 describes research showing that a large percentage of the meat in supermarkets is contaminated with antibiotic resistant bacteria. An evolutionary perspective explains how antibiotic resistance arises in the first place and why the prevalence of resistant bugs in livestock has health professionals and scientists worried.
Evo in the news: A fish of a different color
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 15 minutes
Overview
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.
Evo in the news: A chink in HIV’s evolutionary armor
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Evo in the News article
Time: 20 minutes
Overview
Medical researchers have spent billions of dollars and many decades trying to develop an HIV vaccine but have, thus far, failed. Why is an HIV vaccine so elusive? This news brief from March 2007 explains how HIV's rapid rate of evolution challenges medicine and describes a new discovery that may allow vaccine developers to sidestep that evolution.
Diversity
Grade Level(s):
- K-2
Source:
- Janulaw, Sharon
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 30 minutes each for three sessions
Overview
Students learn that there are many forms of living things by going for a walk and by observing living things in the classroom.
Color variation over time in rock pocket mouse populations
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 50 minutes
Overview
Students watch a short film and complete a worksheet and graphing exercise that reinforces the concepts of variation and natural selection.
Candy Dish Selection
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Tang, Carol
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: 30 minutes
Breeding Bunnies
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- WGBH
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: One class period
Overview
Students simulate breeding bunnies to show the impact that genetics can have on the evolution of a population of organisms.
Born to Run: Artificial Selection Lab
Grade Level(s):
- 6-8
Source:
- Garland, Theodore
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Four 45-minute periods
Overview
Students are introduced to the field of experimental evolution by evaluating skeletal changes in mice that have been artificially selected over many generations for the behavioral trait of voluntary exercise wheel running.
Aloha, spider style! The work of Rosemary Gillespie
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- UC Museum of Paleontology
Resource type:
- Research profile
Time: one class period
Overview
This research profile follows Dr. Rosemary Gillespie to Hawaii as she evaluates hypotheses about the evolution of the colorful happy-face spider.
Allele and phenotype frequencies in rock pocket mouse populations
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: One or two class 50-minute periods
Overview
This video and worksheet use real rock pocket mouse data collected by Dr. Michael Nachman and his colleagues to illustrate the Hardy-Weinberg principle.
Why Sex is Good
Grade Level(s):
- 13-16
Source:
- Herreid, Clyde Freeman
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: portions of several class periods
Overview
This case study is based on a 2005 journal article that deals with the issue of sexual vs. asexual reproduction and their relative merits a question that has bedeviled biologists for more than a century. The article serves as the final stage of this case focusing on why sex is useful (at least in some circumstances).
Webcast: The science of evolution
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
Source:
- New York Times
Resource type:
- Video
Time: 10 minutes
Overview
Evolutionary biologist Sean Carroll introduces the field of Evo-Devo, using examples from fruit flies, butterflies, and icefish to explain how this research is transforming our understanding of evolution.
This video is available from the New York Times website.
Adaptation to altitude
Grade Level(s):
- 9-12
- 13-16
Source:
- Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
Resource type:
- Classroom activity
Time: Eight 50-minute class periods
Overview
In this set of sequenced lessons, students learn how to devise an experiment to test the difference between acclimation and adaptation; investigate how scientific arguments show support for natural selection in Tibetans; design an investigation using a simulation based on the Hardy-Weinberg principle to explore mechanisms of evolution; and devise a test for whether other groups of people have adapted to living at high altitudes.