Teaching Biology without Evolution...
...is like teaching English without verbs. What is left are nouns and adjectives. DNA, enzyme, long bone, ductus arteriosus, pretty bird. Rote memorization. The reason why my (adult education) students are afraid of and bored with science to begin with.I am starting my biology lectures tomorrow. I have no control over the syllabus. The pages and chapters on evolution were removed from the syllabus. Sorry, but I am starting with evolution tomorrow night. I cannot speak English without verbs.
And I agree. Having had the same experience about rote memorization, I couldn't agree more.
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tags: Max-Planck Institut für Biophysik, Frankfurt am Main,
How can you tell what a megalomaniac is really up to? You find out what the megalomaniac is accusing everyone else of. That's what they are up to.
Also from Miriam, not the famous old (and beloved by my kids) rote memorization of e
Michael Nielsen wrote another long thought-provoking essay (for his book, I guess):
I tried writing that post without any verbs, but it made no sense...
And, yes, I talked about evolution tonight. Just a little bit tonight (more on scientific method and some basic cell and DNA stuff to get them started) - a whole big lecture next week. I used the confusion of the switch between two editions of the textbook to make "typos" in the syllabus and assign all the evolution chapters for next week.