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Evolution resources for the public school teacherTarget audience of this web site According to several polls, most public school biology teachers do not accept evolution as a satisfactory explanation of how life changes over time. These teachers believe that Creationism, Intelligent Design Creationism, etc., should be offered along with the "theory" of evolution, and these people sometimes act on these inclinations. This site is not for these teachers, who arguably chose the wrong profession -- or at least the wrong discipline -- in the first place. For the remaining teachers, those who accept evolution and are excited to teach it, welcome. I have collected some resources, below, in the hopes of making your lives easier. If you have suggestions on how to make the site more helpful, I would be glad to add additional articles, links, and commentary where needed.
For experienced teachers, you know why this site is necessary. For the newly certified and for those who have been traveling abroad for their entire adult life, you might not fully appreciate the challenges of teaching biology in the United States. Despite being one of the richest and most technologically advanced nations on the planet, it is by far the most backwards in terms of science knowledge. Indeed, in the United States, people express a certain amount of pride in being willfully backward. This ignorance reaches extraordinary levels when it comes to evolution: only Turkey seems to have a lower level of acceptance of evolution. Unless you teach in college towns, there will likely be considerable and constant pressure from parents, principals, school boards, and even kids for you to maintain this level of ignorance for yet another generation. Here are some good articles for background:
If you ask anyone but me, they will likely say, "when kids are in high school; or maybe, if they are smart, in middle school." In fact, this is what I used to believe. But because I (1) teach evolution, (2) have two young kids of my own, (3) and am not opposed to experimenting on them, I can now assure you that the ability to comprehend descent with modification, natural selection, speciation, and other related concepts can be easily taught to kindergartners and first-graders. It doesn't make their brains explode, it doesn't give them nightmares, and it doesn't make them steal their friends lunch money. On the contrary, once children understand that "Y evolved from X", they are filled with a curiosity about life that is lacking in most children. There is, I discovered afterwards, a very large literature about when, exactly, children start to develop theories about the origin of life and the origin of adaptations. This literature shows that kids are "primed" to learn evolution even before first grade. Therefore, waiting until high school to explain the reality of life seems a bit late. About 10 years too late.
It's a work in progress, but hopefully it will give you some ideas and resources. It's especially good if you can couple classroom learning with a trip to your local zoo, many of which have the actual beasts. You could also have a fun time making tortoises (in their different shapes) with Play-Doh.
Evolution is the unifying principle in biology, so good biology standards use evolution as the unifying structure onto which all facts (DNA replication, physiology, etc.) are "tacked on." In other words, don't just have an evolution "unit" -- invoke natural selection throughout the whole course.
Although most state teaching associations are too scared to come out and support strong evolution standards (or even any evolution standards!), there are several national organizations that have "statements of support" that are good to read.
For some states, good support can come from "Citizens for Science" groups (e.g., Pennsylvania Citizens for Science). These groups were created expressly for providing support for teachers such as yourself, so don't be shy about bothering them and asking for help. Here's a listing of such groups. If your state doesn't have one, consider starting one up! If you have a kid at home who needs some evolution today, check out http://wikids.wikispaces.com/...a site that is being designed for youngsters curious about life, fossils, and evolution (and more). Another great resource is the new blog, Evolved Homeschooling, which has great information for anyone interested in communicating evolution (and supernatural-free science) to children. The site features book reviews, "cool science in the news", hints for parents, and much more. This site is especially welcome because the only evolution instruction that young children get is from their parents -- so everyone is a homeschooler when it comes to this topic. If you have a similar site or interest, please consider joining their "webring" to build an online community. But if you really want to feel supported, become a member of the National Center for Science Education (http://www.ncseweb.org/). The $30 may seem a bit expensive, but you get an immensely useful publication, Reports of the NCSE, plus you get a dedicated staff that will answer your email, quickly, if you have a concern about evolution instruction in your school, district, or state. Their web site, free to the world, is an amazing resource for teachers, kindergarten through college, who want to improve their students' understanding of modern science.
If you teach, you already have the State Science Standards on your desk. However, you might live in a state with really terrible science standards, so I highly recommend that you explore the science standards (for your grade level) mandated by other states. Similarly, compare your state's standards to the National Standards.
To get a really good sense of how good, or bad, your states science standards are, I highly recommend the Lawrence Lerner Fordham Reports.
If you have no budget for this, please consider putting a "needs" list up on your door so that parents (when they visit) can see that you have needs. Chances are there will be somebody who would be delighted to buy the book for you, or who would donate the book (in your honor, if you'd like) to the school library so that all teachers in the school could use it. Most of the below are for kids, by the way.
The University of California and Indiana University both have trustworthy collections of evolution lesson plans (first several links), although their sites might benefit from web design improvements and more frequent edits. Aside from these sites, good archives of evolution-related plans are scarce, and many of the ones that are available and classroom-tested are truly boring, probably sent up by Satan (or down, from the Intelligent Designer) to numb the brains of young learners. And many have been carefully sanitized to make them more palatable to anti-evolution supervisors and parents, with instances of "evolution" replaced with "change over time" and other related tricks. Similarly, many lesson plans are well meaning in their attempts to "teach the controversy" yet only confuse students into believing that scientists actually find the topic of evolution even remotely controversial. Finally, many are outright damaging and inappropriate for a science class: crossword puzzles, coloring pages, etc. with overt religious themes (such as "help the lost animals find the Ark"; see more, if you need a laugh). Outside of the first three sites, lesson plans should be scrutinized as carefully as a cookie found unattended on the ground.
From what I know about teaching in public schools, students get the most out of lessons that teachers dream up themselves. If you have a love of cats, for example, designing lesson plans on wild cat evolution, cat artificial selection, cat adaptations, and cat "parent versus offspring resemblance" will be deeply rewarding to yourself and to your students, even if they are fundamentally dog people. Moreover, making your own lessons is often the only way to satisfy the peculiarities of different state science standards.
More and more public school teachers are setting up web pages for their courses, it seems. You can use such pages to your advantage, I think, to promote evolution without getting stoned by parents. Here are my suggestions:
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Here's some thoughts about teaching evolution to elementary school students, using giant Galapagos tortoises as an example:
