Biology Commons^™

Exploring The Longitudinal Effects: Non-Traditional Pedagogies And Practical Learning On Biology Education And Medical Understanding, Thomas Ziebro

Honors Projects

Medical disinformation is becoming a rampant problem in the United States, and the Covid-19 pandemic highlighted it. There have been attempts to fight the problem at the source through fact verification. These attempts have been unsuccessful. This paper investigates the efficacy of non-traditional pedagogies and the correlation between them and an individual perceived and practical ability to understand their primary care provider. The purpose of this research was to establish whether non-traditional pedagogies at the secondary and post-secondary level are more effective than traditional lecture-based instruction. The research was conducted through an anonymous cross-sectional survey which included questions about educational …

How To Spark Bio Curiosity: An Innovative High School Biology Curriculum, Audrie Charles

Graduate Research Showcase

This project is a researched creative endeavor focused around the creation of an exemplary high school biology course. This presentation will showcase an original high school biology curriculum designed to ignite students’ innate curiosity and empower meaningful learning of core concepts like cell structure, genetics, evolution and ecology. Students revisit key ideas through a spiral curriculum that builds complexity, tackling open-ended problems and collaborating on hands-on inquiries like formulating hypotheses, designing experiments, collecting data and drawing evidence-based conclusions. Tangible projects allow students to demonstrate content knowledge in addition to critical thinking abilities like synthesizing concepts, evaluating claims and applying learning …

Extranodal Tumors And Chromosomal Abnormalities Associated With Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma In T(14;18)-Positive Patients, Alexis Finch

Honors Theses

Nebraska is mostly an agricultural state with a non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) incidence rate of 20.1 per 100,000 individuals, which is greater than the US incidence rate of 19 per 100,000 individuals. It is possible that the higher incidence rate in Nebraska is due to an increase in pesticide usage. Pesticide exposure is linked to t(14;18), a genetic translocation involving the BCL2 gene that regulates apoptosis. The dysregulation of apoptosis could contribute to the proliferation of NHL. This exploratory study utilized the Nebraska Lymphoma Study Group, which consists of patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, Hodgkin disease, or some other neoplastic hematologic disorder …

Lesson Plans In Astronomy, Ecology And Biology, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

This document contains various lesson plan ideas for concepts within the fields of biology, ecology, astronomy, and geology.

Plant Maze, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

Students plant bean sprouts to observe their growth.

The Science Of Baking Bread, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

Activity plan to teach biology and chemistry using a lesson on the baking of bread.

Can Tilt Be Used To Teach Study Tactics? A Case Study In A Biology Classroom, Anne Jacobs

Perspectives In Learning

Recently, there has been a movement encouraging instructors in higher education to use the Transparency in Teaching and Learning (TILT) framework when designing assignments. This framework helps instructors clarify their expectations and evaluation criteria. Making assignments more transparent may result in greater student success. However, it is less clear how this framework can be applied to classes that use exams as a main method of assessing student learning. One option might be to use a TILTed assignment to introduce students to learning tools to improve their studying. I did this by giving students in an introductory biology class an assignment …

Uncovering A Natural History Mystery At The University Of Akron, Gary M. Holliday, Lara Roketenetz

Proceedings from the Document Academy

Students were engaged in a combination of detective work, biology, archives, art, and education/outreach to prepare a collection of taxidermied birds donated to the University of Akron by the Rhodes family in the early 1900s for public access and exhibition. Students had the opportunity to learn from leading experts regarding the historical significance of biological collections, proper preservation protocols, digitizing and archival practices, and the urgency of science education and communication for a public audience. Many campus and community partners were involved, including experts from local museums and nature centers.

Students Interest And Thoughts On Stem, Chrisitine Girtain

STEM Month

I am Juan Sebastian Bohorquez Mora, I am a sophomore student at Toms River High School North. I am interested in biofuels because I believe they are a good option to replace fossil fuels. I am also interested in duckweed because biofuels are made out of crops, and people need to eat those crops. That’s when duckweed comes in and it can be used as a feedstock for ethanol production which is a biofuel. Bioethanol is a type of biofuel and it is derived from the corn’s starch. Instead of making ethanol from the corn’s starch, we can use duckweed …

Food For Thought: The Relationship Between Nutrition And Academic Performance, Sarah Freeman

Honors Projects in Science and Technology

Nutrition has been shown to impact the level of cognitive function in individuals. Through the analysis of nutritional diets, this new research will aim to uncover the impact that diet has on cognitive function of Bryant University students by analyzing their ability to perform on a variety of cognitive assessments. This study will provide recommendations to students at Bryant University on what they should eat so they can perform their best academically. This research will also investigate whether Bryant University is offering the best food for students to eat setting them up for success.

Bacteriophage That Infect Gordonia Species Show Varying Host Specificity And Infection, Lindsay Birge

Honors Theses

Bacteriophage (phage) are an incredibly abundant species of virus that infect bacteria. One major characteristic of phage is their small host range- many phage are known to infect only one or a few hosts. This phage and host relationship has led to phage therapy recently becoming highlighted as a possible alternative to traditional antibiotics in light of the growing antibiotic resistance crisis. The study of phage host specificity has risen in line with this concept, as a phage with a more extensive host range can provide more opportunities for use as an antibiotic. Samples of phage previously isolated on a …

Can Gdp Be Predictive Of Fertility Rates In Sweden?, Hannah Coleman

Honors Theses

Fertility rates in a country vary and can be influenced by numerous different aspects of an individual’s life and the society in which they live. One aspect that may influence fertility rates at the national level is the gross domestic product (GDP). GDP is an indicator of a country’s economic productivity. Because fertility is linked to both economic development and individual resources, GDP may be a useful indicator of fertility rates. If so, knowing or predicting GDP could be used to project the fertility rates of a population years into the future. To determine if a reasonable connection between GDP …

Teaching Muscle Function And Physical Fitness: An Afterschool Program For Elementary Schools, Julianna Peters

Honors Theses

For this creative project, a nine-week club curriculum about muscle function and exercise was designed for upper elementary students (4^th-6^th grade), integrating science and physical education. This curriculum aims to introduce students to a basic understanding of muscle function and their body utilizing a scientific lens while also encouraging movement through the education of different muscle groups. It principally covers the three types of muscle with an emphasis on skeletal muscles. Students engage in experiments and activities focused on different aspects of muscle function and then do exercises focused on certain muscle groups. Additionally, it aims to …

Black Apollo Of Science: The Life Of Ernest Everett Just - Summarizing Timeline, Sumitography And Concept Poster, Lillie R. Jenkins

Perkins Faculty Research and Special Events

This two-part chronology is based on Kenneth R. Manning’s biography, Black Apollo of Science: The Life of Ernest Everett Just (1983). Like other such timelines, this one details Just’s life and pioneering research work. Additionally, and distinctively, this timetable lays out Just’s pioneering fund-seeking and his work mentoring African American female co-researchers (Part 1). A sumitography featuring the United States Postal Service’s postage stamp (1996) recognizes Just’s innovative thinking in biology (Part 2). Following this logic, the author includes a proof-of-concept poster commending E.E. Just’s work as a forward-thinking administrator. This timeline summarizes, chronicles, and aims to re-frame Just’s …

Cultivating A Stem Investigation: Reading And Task Expectations For Introductory Biology Courses, Tina M. Ballard

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

College completion is an important discussion in today’s world with only about 30% of community college students completing their degrees within three years of starting their programs. Especially in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) fields, students are changing their majors or not completing their degrees for a variety of reasons. Previous research has established that there are high attrition and failure rates for introductory biology courses which may be causing some students to change their majors or not complete their degrees. This multicase study investigated the reading and task demands for introductory biology courses designed for STEM majors …

Student Success Of Online Vs. In-Person Biology Courses At Virginia Community Colleges, Jennifer Claire Scott

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Community colleges have a significant role in preparing students for STEM-related careers through certificates, degrees, and transfers to four-year institutions. In addition, online education is a growing mode of higher education, particularly for community college students. However, community college and online students are both at a high risk of attrition and show a lower success rate for degree completion. The purpose of this study was to identify differences in attrition and success between students in online and in-person biology courses at Virginia community colleges. Also, this study addressed downstream effects of online education by examining course completion of second-semester biology …

Lifelines Fall 2020, Southern Adventist University

Lifelines - Biology Department Newsletter

The Fall 2020 issue of Lifelines contains articles on Insights from the Professor, Alumni Highlight, and Department Happenings.

An Investigation Of The Impacts Of Traditional, Virtual, And Hybrid Biological Laboratories On College Students’ Achievement And Motivation To Learn Biology, Shavonda Jackson

Dissertations

Virtual courses function in a different manner than traditional courses, therefore they require teaching methods and assessment techniques geared specifically to maximize this learning experience. Internet-based learning and distance-education are no longer new concepts in the science field. Because of this, many collegiate biology programs have created courses that can be taken virtual or hybrid. A number of experimental studies have had great influence in terms of the effects and impacts of educational technology in relation to virtual laboratories.

However, not many studies emphasize the impact of hybrid laboratories on student achievement or assess students’ motivation to learn in a …

Teaching Natural And Artificial Selection In Production Agriculture, Madhav P. Nepal, Clayton W. Scott

iLEARN Teaching Resources

In this lesson, students will learn how natural selection and artificial selection impact both production agriculture and biological sciences. A natural selection is a mechanism that favors heritable traits that increase species survival and reproduction. Artificial selection is a selective breeding, where humans select for desirable traits in agricultural products.

Developing A Writing Intensive (Wi) Microbiology Lab Course, Jeremy Dodsworth

Q2S Enhancing Pedagogy

Students at CSUSB will be required to take two courses designated as writing intensive (WI) after the quarter-to-semester (Q2S) transition in Fall 2020. Having WI courses in the Biology major will allow Biology students to satisfy the WI requirement and a major requirement/elective with one course, and having WI course in the major will help students develop discipline-specific critical thinking and writing skills. The current upper-division Microbiology course involves a significant amount of writing. Here I present plans for augmentation and modification of the writing activities and assignments in this Microbiology course associated with Q2S to potentially fulfill the WI …

The Process And A Pitfall In Developing Biology And Chemistry Problems For Mathematics Courses, Mary Beisiegel, Lori Kayes, Devon Quick, Richard Nafshun, Michael Lopez, Steve Dobrioglo, Michael Dickens

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

In this paper, we describe our process for developing applied problems from biology and chemistry for use in a differential calculus course. We describe our conversations and curricular analyses that led us to change from our initial focus on college algebra to calculus. We provide results that allowed us to see the overlaps between biology and mathematics and chemistry and mathematics and led to a specific focus on problems related to rates of change. Finally, we investigate the problems that were developed by the partner disciplines for use on recitation activities in calculus and how those problems were modified by …

Lifelines Winter 2020, Southern Adventist University

Lifelines - Biology Department Newsletter

The Winter 2020 issue of Lifelines contains articles on students in service, insights from the professor, and departmental happenings.

Bringing Science To Life In The Fifth-Grade Classroom Through Hands-On Learning, Kelly Gately

Honors Program Theses and Projects

Science helps provide insight into the unknown and provides an outlet for exploration of living things. Children are innately curious about how thing work, and they are eager to ask questions. Science is the perfect outlook for students to fully engage in their inquisitiveness, but yet, many classrooms are skipping over science lessons or choosing to heavily focus on other subjects, such as reading and writing. Science is often taught as an elective, integrated with other subjects or it is only focused on for a short period of time. Unfortunately, when this subject does receive attention, lessons are heavily text-book …

Student Perceptions Of Reasons For Lecture And Active Learning, Calan Koch

Honors Theses

With perceived student resistance to active learning in the classroom, instructors are hesitant to implement such methods into their classroom structure despite how effective they may be. This research seeks to understand student perceptions related to the transition to higher prevalence of active learning techniques. We aimed to find answers to how students perceive the ideal classroom to be structured, what reasons they perceive for lecture and active learning components, and possible explanations to concerns of groupwork during class time. We analyzed 64 interviews with undergraduate biology students at the University of Nebraska- Lincoln, developed coding rubrics from commonly found …

The Social Construction Of Life: Critical Thinking About Biology In Society, Peter J. Taylor

Working Papers on Science in a Changing World

This book aims to expand the boundaries of the influences that readers consider when interpreting the practices and products of the life sciences ("biology") and their impact on society. The chapter topics include: Interpreting Ideas of Nature; The structure of origin stories; Multiple layers in influencing an audience: The case of Darwin's On the Origin of Species; Metaphors of coordination and development; What causes a disease?—the consequences of hereditarianism in the case of pellagra; How changeable are IQ test scores?; Social negotiations around genetic screening; Intersecting processes involving genes and environment.

Each chapter consists of 5 parts:

1. Introduce simple …

The Impact Of Online Homework, Time On Homework, Gender, And Metacognition In Improving Student Achievement In Undergraduate Biology Courses, Donald Bishop Cook Jr

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This study sought to address a gap in the literature to determine whether a relationship exists between use of online homework and student achievement in undergraduate biology courses. Previous studies have examined other STEM courses, but few have considered biology. The purpose of the study was to determine whether homework grades in online homework systems can predict student achievement in introductory undergraduate biology courses. This study utilized a correlational analysis by multiple regression using archival data to determine whether final course grades in undergraduate biology courses can be predicted by grades on online homework, time spent on online homework, gender, …

The Effect Of An Historical Geology Course On Students’ Attitudes Towards Science And Their Knowledge Of Deep Time As A Threshold To Their Knowledge Of Evolution, Allan Nolan

Dissertations

In America there exists a conflict between a small group of its citizens and the concept of evolution. Researchers have studied this conflict and the ways in which teachers might approach educational methodologies that not only address evolution in a sensitive manner, but also remain legally acceptable.

This research was designed to address teaching evolution in the context of deep time – the concept that time is vast and that geology and biology operate in a timescale of hundreds of millions to billions of years. In previous peer-reviewed works, it has been stated that deep time acts as a threshold …

The Savegre: Completing The Case Study, Aggie R. Veld, Emilie R. Janes

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Since case studies garner the interest of students necessary for engagement in general biology classes (Himschoot, 2012), the purpose of this project was to create a case study based on the history of San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica and Leo and Zana Finkenbinder’s involvement in its transition to sustainability. Travel to Costa Rica occurred in the summer of 2015. Authors Aggie Veld and Emilie Janes presented the story of the case study and progress to date during Honors Week 2016. Since then, the case study was submitted to SUNY Buffalo’s National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science. Feedback …

Top-Down And Bottom-Up Approaches To Understanding The Fate Of The Federally Endangered Schaus’ Swallowtail Butterfly (Heraclides Aristodemus Ponceanus), Jaeson T. Clayborn

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The federally endangered Schaus’ swallowtail butterfly (Heraclides aristodemus ponceanus) populations have declined precipitously over the years. Despite tremendous efforts to augment the numbers of this butterfly through captive-bred releases and habitat enhancements, it remains imperiled and federally endangered. The dissertation’s objectives were: 1) to restore dry forest habitat in Biscayne National Park (BNP) for Schaus’ swallowtails; 2) to assess host plant (torchwood and wild lime) survivorship and growth in the restoration sites (BNP) and project dry forest habitat loss because of imminent sea level rise (SLR); 3) to quantify ant activity and record predator-prey interactions against Heraclides caterpillars …

A Teachable Unit On Soft Corals With Instructional Method Variances, Emily Breech

Honors Projects

The soft coral Sinularia flexibilis contains an aqueous alcohol extract that has shown antineoplastic activity against lymphocytic leukemia (Weinheimer and Matson, 1977). It also has other biological properties that work as antimicrobials, anti-inflammatory agents, and cytotoxicity activities (Kamel and Slattery, 2005). There is much research on the effects of flow rate on growth and morphology (Khalesi, Beeftink, & Wijffels, 2007) and the effects of light-dependency on growth rate (Khalesi, Beeftink, & Wijffels, 2009). The purpose of this student project was to further research on S. flexibilis, as well as incorporate that research into evaluating the effects of lecture-based teaching …