This topic’s one that I use when I’m talking with year 10 students about critical thinking: ear candling. It involves the close approach of ears & candles. Hollow, burning candles.
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more on the pau d’arco question
The question in question was about the proposed use of the herb pau d’arco as a prophylactic against MRSA: Evaluate the claims of the therapist, then use your biological knowledge to discuss the advice given. What are the possible evolutionary & ecological outcomes of the proposed treatment?
Continue readingdid dinosaurs have lungs like those of birds?
If you studied animal form & function in year 12, you may well have looked at gas exchange systems. Most first-year bio courses will build on that, & at Waikato we introduce a whole range: skin surface, external & internal gills, the tracheal system in insects, & lungs. Including bird lungs. Now, bird lungs are […]
Continue readingthinking carefully about the question
We spend quite a bit of time on critical thinking during the Schol preparation days. This is because of the need – identified by the examiner’s report every year – for candidates to think critically about both the question (just what is the examiner asking me to do?) and their response to it (what, of all […]
Continue readingbig brains, c-sections, & evolution
A very quick one tonight (I’ve just got back from a Schol Bio session in Hawkes Bay & the brain’s not up to much!) – PZ Myers has an excellent post critiquing a paper that suggested that human evolution could be affected by the increasing incidence of caesarian deliveries. This is an idea that’s cropped up from time […]
Continue readinganswers to wells’ questions – all in one place
Cedric’s suggested that I should collate all my answers to Wells’ "10 questions to ask your biology teacher" all in one place. It hadn’t even occurred to me, so – thanks, Cedric, & here you are 🙂
Continue readinga pile of brown stuff
I was eating my muesli & idly flicking through the ‘lifestyle’ insert that comes with the morning paper when I happened on a page of ways to get oneself healthy for summer. Since at the moment my preparation for summer consists of walking the dog every morning & pedalling madly on the exercycle in the […]
Continue readinghas human evolution stopped?
The other day I mentioned I was reading Steve Jones’ book, Coral. He’s a good writer & I’ve enjoyed Coral, just as I’ve enjoyed most of his other books (although The single helix didn’t quite work so well for me). Anyway, yesterday a friend sent me a link to a report about a talk Jones had given – […]
Continue readingdeconstructing ‘processes & patterns of evolution’
A while ago my friend Heather, who’s a biology teacher, asked if I would write something on answering questions in the ‘processes & patterns of evolution’ paper (AS90717). Here you are, Heather – I finally got around to it 🙂
Continue readingso what’s that 10th question?
For the last of his ’10 questions to ask your biology teacher’, Jonathan Wells offers: EVOLUTION A FACT? Why are we told that Darwin’s theory of evolution is a scientific fact — even though many of its claims are based on misrepresentations of the facts?
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