From today’s "Letters to the Editor" in today’s NZ Herald: Your correspondent correctly states that Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution is under threat. The main threat, however, is not coming from "conservative religious school." It is coming from science. Well, as a scientist, this is news to me. What scientific evidence does our correspondent present […]
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using pseudoscience to teach science
The following post is an article that I originally wrote for the New Zealand Science Teacher journal (the official journal of the New Zealand Association of Science Educators), and is reproduced here by kind permission of the editor. We live in a time when science features large in our lives, probably more so than ever […]
Continue readingPM’s Science Teacher Prize: Dr Angela Sharples
The Prime Minister’s Science Prizes were announced today, & among the winners was my good friend & colleague Angela Sharples, who was awarded the Science Teacher Prize. Angela & I have worked together to prepare NZ’s teams for the International Biology Olympiad since 2004, during which time I’ve seen first-hand just what a superb teacher […]
Continue readingassessment for learning
A few days back, Grant asked if I would follow up on my promise to write something on assessment. It would be great to get a discussion going around how & why we assess students, so after a bit of thought I decided to kick things off with the following post, derived from my own […]
Continue readingwhat about genetic evidence linking us to chimpanzees
As Grant said earlier, there is a rich mine of potential posts in this particular website… This time, let’s review its author’s take on the phylogenetic relationship between Homo sapiens and Pan troglodytes. We are indeed linked to chimpanzees – by a common Designer.
Continue readingprior learning & university success in biology
One of the sessions at FYBEC – on the changes in NCEA Achievement Standards in order to align them with the 2007 Curriculum document – generated a lot of discussion. It was great to have this session, as a heads-up to the changes in prior learning that we’ll see in students coming in to uni-level […]
Continue readingchallenges in learning biology
I spent Monday & Tuesday of this week down in Wellington, attending the 2nd First-Year Biology Educators’ Colloquium. (Yes, that’s a mouthful! We usually just say FYBEC to those in the know.) It was really refreshing to spend time focusing on how we teach first-year biology at university, and on research into ways to enhance […]
Continue readingwhat about archaeopteryx?
As a distraction (or should that be ‘procrastination’?) from what’s currently filling up my diary (ie processing student enrolments), I’ve decided to look at another of those ‘science’ statements from the school documents I linked to in my last post. "What about the archeopteryx?" they ask. Well, what about it? This, from their webpage: The […]
Continue readingwriting about environmental history
Over lunch today I had a really interesting conversation about environmental history and why it’s a Good Thing to know about. Much of the discussion was around the environmental history of Palmerston North, where I lived for about 22 years, first as a student at Massey University & subsequently as a teacher (first in various […]
Continue readingpicking & choosing what to believe in…
In my last post on a ‘creationist biology curriculum’ I asked the question: what, exactly, do they teach? Over on the Sciblogs site (where this blog is syndicated), a commenter answered by pointing me at another school’s curriculum. As I read through it, I could feel the area beneath my collar getting distinctly heated. This […]
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