The best way to learn Part 3

I have learned a lot this week. I learned many different methods of learning, and how effective all of these methods are according to the people who submitted them. One problem i am facing is how to test each of these methods. I haven’t quite solved it but I am thinking of doing an experiment where I have people memorize stif using a certain method, and then test them on the material to how effective the method is. My next step is to figure out how to test these methods, and to test them. Once I have my results, this experiment can be applied to the way a lot of students study.

Unit 8 refleection

This unit was about evolution, which is the change in a species over time, and the different mechanisms that caused evolution. One of these mechanisms is natural selection. Natural selection works by rewarding the individuals that have better adaptations for survival. We did two lads that demonstrated this principle. In our Bird Beak Lab, and our Hunger Games Lab we simulated natural selection by competing against each other to get food. There are a few other mechanisms of population change. these include genetic drift, which is when a chance event suddenly kills a large portion of the gene pool. Another example is when an organism moves from one population to another. The third mechanism of evolution is sexual selection, This is when organisms are selected based on mating success, and not survival ability. We also learned about the evidence of evolution such as fossils, and vestigial structure, which are similar parts of different animals with different purposes. 

I still wan't to know more about the origin of life. I am very curious about how the first life was created, and this question could be helpful in understanding how we got to where we are. In my Unit 7 reflection I talked about how i was mainly assertive, but a little passive aggressive. I worked on this during my biology project, and tried to be nice to people, and say what I want. I still need to work on being less passive-aggressive, with people I don't like, but I have made good progress.

Man Evolution


Different types of finches

Examples of Vestigial Structures

Timeline reflection

One of the most important event in Earth's history if not the most important event was the beginning of life on earth. While scientist are unsure how life was initially formed, it is still undoubted one of the most important events, in earth's history for a couple of reasons. First, it was an extremely unlikely event, and was very complex. For that reason knowing how life first formed would be very helpful to understanding how we got to where we are, and how likely it is that life exists in other place in the universe. The other reason is that the first life, whatever it was, was the beginning of every living thing that exists, without that beginning no life would exist.

Another very important event in earth's history is the Cambrian explosion. It was during this event that life became more diverse. This event is important because it was the event that created diversity in life. During this event nearly all of the major groups of animals began to appear. It was this rapid diversification that led to the creation of many of the species that currently exist.

Another major event in Earth was when life first went onto land. This was also very important, because it was the beginning on life moving out from the oceans, and spreading out through the entirety of earth. This also marked the beginning of a huge new section of earth's history. It created a whole new place for life to expand, and evolve. This event is responsible from a lot of the diversity we see on this planet.

I was really surprised by how long life has been on earth, and that despite that, it was very simple for a very long time, and then is suddenly shot up in a relatively short period of time. It was also interesting to think about how huge Earth's history is, and that everything that we ware taught in our history classes are only a tiny portion of that history. It also profound to me that despite only having existed for a very short time humans have affected the planet so much. It is very weird to think that what took nature such a long time to create has been dramatically changed so quickly. The one question I still how is how did life first get formed?

Image from here

Hunger Games Lab

1. We did a lab that simulated evolution in a population by having everybody in the class divide evenly into three different genotypes(AA, Aa, and aa). We than had everyone stand in a big circle, and corks would be spread out in the middle. We would then go and pick up as many corks as we could. AA could only grab corks with their wrist                                    Aa could only grab corks between their 1st and 2nd fingers.  aa could only grab between their thumb and first fingers   Once all the corks had been picked up we would count how many we had, and if we got enough we could reproduce, and then it would repeat. 
2. The phenotype for picking up food between the thumb and first finger was the the best, because it could pick up the corks the fastest, and the most easily.
3. The populations evolved. We know the because the allele frequency changed. The initial frequency was roughly equal, with a at 48%, and A at 52%. The a:A ratio got to 73% : 27% in one round, but ended at 60% : 40%
                      
4. There were several things that were random in this lab such as the distribution of food, what offspring were produced by flipping the coin, and how aggressive people were in getting the food. The way people were required to pickup the food was non random. The random distribution of food, and the different levels of aggression resulted in some  people survived better based on luck, and not based on their phenotype.
5. The result would have been similar if the food had been smaller. The knucklers, and stumpys would have done worse, bet the pincher would still do the same. If the food had been bigger, then the knucklers, and pinchers would die off because they couldn't pick it up. That would represent a change in the available food supply.
6. If there was no incomplete dominance, then the knucklers would not exist, and the pinchers would be the most common, and the stupmys would still pop up occasionally, but it would be Mose difficult, and the allele would eventually disappear altogether.
7. Natal selection is the mechanism that allows evolution to happen. Without natural selection, then evolution would be completely random, there would be evolution, but it would be only due to sexual selection, genetic drift, and gene flow.
8. Some people were more aggressive, or used their hoods to store corks. This allowed them to do better. and increase their likelihood of reproducing. This made their allele(s) slightly more common, and this is similar to hen some animals are smarter that others, but it is not a genetic factor.
9. In evolution the population evolves. The individuals either die or survive, but the allele frequency of the population changes. Natural selection acts on the phenotype, but the genotype also changes, because the phenotype is what determines whether or not an organism survives, and the phenotype is determined by the genotype so that also has to change.
10. I still wornder why the knuckler did the best.

The best way to learn part 2

I have learned a lot about my topic of how to learn things faster. I have found some broad methods such as take breaks, and some more specific methods that focus on different tyes of learning(auditory, visual, etc.). I am having trouble finding multiple methods to test, so I created a survey to fugure out what types of tequniques people are already ulilizing. I shard this link through facebook, and I am continuing to reasearch tequniqes while I wait for results. Once I have results I will then come up with a way to test the methods, and cary out this test to determine which ones are the most effective. Once I have my results, this experement can be aplied to the way a lot of students study.

Bird Beak Lab

Part 1	Spoon Chicks	Binder Clip Chicks	Tweaser Chicks	Scissor Chicks	Totals
Total Chicks Born	21	9	29	12	71
Percent of Chicks Born	30%	13%	41%	16%	100%

In this lab we simulated natural selection by using tweasers, spoons, binderclips, and scissors to represent diffrent types of bird beakes. This lab showed two of darwin´s principles. One is thes individgals with better traits have more offspring. This is shown is our lab, by the fact that our beak that was the best, the twaesers created the most offspring at 29(see top graph) followed by 21, 12, and then 9, for the worst beak.

The other principle is that the populations look like the winners. This is also shown by our lab. We found that the tweasers had the best traits, and therefor had the most offsping and the population was becoming mostly with that trait. By only three years the population was 41% tweasears. The spoon was next with 30%, and the other two dropped to 16%, and 13%.


In our lab we asked the question if natural selection occurs in a population, how do changes in selective pressures affect the evolution of that species?" We found that if if there are winners, and losers in a evolution, the population looks like the winners, and the tweasers are the winners, then the population will be mostly tweasers. We also found that if we change the selective pressures, then the winners, and losers will change. To simulate the change, we made one type of food poisonous. This resulted in all of the populations dropping a little bit, except the scissors, because they couldn't food any way. The spoon beak did the worst because it was hard for it to control what it picks up.

Two errors, are that after every year chicks were produced, but we still only used one of each beak type in each experiment. This resulted in a linear growth. instead of an exponential growth that would have been more accurate. The other is that we had different strategies for picking up food, the resulted in some beaks doing better purely because the were smarter. to fix this we should create more guidelines for how to pickup food.

This lab was done to demonstrate natural selection. It demonstrated the competition between the different organisms.I learned how different phenotypes affect how will different species survive. Also, this supported observations of Darwin. This can be used to about the threats of invasive species. Based on my experience from this lab, I now get a closer understanding of the competition between animals.

Part 2	Spoon Chicks	Binder Clip Chicks	Tweaser Chicks	Scissor Chicks	Totals
Total Chicks Born	12	6	21	15	54
Percent of Chicks Born	22%	11%	39%	28%	100%