Chapter 14 and 15 Presentations
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Genetic and Anatomical Variation among species
Earth Day 2014! Today is a special day for our planet... many people today will begin to see the change they can make to not only our local communities and ecosystem, but the larger biosphere as a whole. Volunteers around the world will increase their recycling efforts, plant trees, and educate people on their individual human impact on the environment. As part of our unit on Evolution and leading into our next unit covering Ecology, we listened to a TED Talk by George Monbiot titled "For more wonder, rewild the world". His take on rewilding certainly brings to light many conversations about not only the human impact on the environment, but also the many species that inhabit our planet. In his talk, he discusses the impact of the wolves in Yellowstone National Park as well as the whales in the ocean. Their impact as a species is tremendous in maintaining a balanced ecosystem! As part of Earth Day, our classes took advantage of NASA's #GlobalSelfie request and went outside to snap a picture and soak up some Vitamin D! For more information about Earth Day - check out this history! The History of Earth Day One last thing, our planet is pretty awesome....... Natural Selection How does the series of events (1-4) depicted in the image to the show the progression of natural selection? As noted in your simulation packet, there are three conditions for evolution being demonstrated... can you identify all three? We will discuss these driving forces in further detail tomorrow during class - your job is to identify them before class! Natural Selection
R.I.P. Reat Underwood Today was certainly a long and emotional day for for all those in the Blue Valley High School family as we coped with the loss of one of our outstanding students - Reat Underwood, The stories I have heard from students and fellow teachers about this young man have been nothing short of amazing. He clearly touched the lives of many, many people during his time with us. Hopefully you all will continue to remember his smile and energy for life as well as all of your positive, happy memories! What has amazed me the most in this situation is the response by the students and the Blue Valley community as a whole. The strength, maturity, and unity by this student body and district has been truly uplifting. Blue Valley High School truly is a family! Thank you to the many schools in the KC Metro area that extended their
support for Reat's family, friends, and school! What Darwin Never Knew... In 1859, Darwin published his theory of natural selection in On the Origin of Species. This was ground breaking work that theorized that organisms have and always will continually change based upon responses to their environments. Now, 150 years later, scientists and researchers have been able to confirm many of Darwin's findings through genetic research. When Darwin made his first initial observations, he did so only using his eyes... not knowing the depth and complexity of our genetic identity. Now, we have the ability to study the DNA sequences and its many genes to see the evolutionary changes at the genetic level! What's important to remember is these evolutionary changes - such as developing limbs or the change in human height - occur over many generations based upon the survival of the "most fit" individual in the environment. TO DO:
Unit 8: Evolution Today, we had the opportunity to voice our current opinions and level of understanding of evolution through a free write... What does "survival of the fittest" mean to you? As scientists... all we can do is observe the observable and reach conclusions based on those observations. Our goal is not to determine the basis of humanity, but rather to openly discuss the observable evolutionary changes experienced by all living and extinct organisms that have occurred throughout time - whether through environmental stress, selective mating, or mutations.
UPDATE - STUDY GUIDE POSTED AT BOTTOM NOVA - Cracking Your Genetic Code If you could create a Utopia, what would it look like? How would people interact? Would there be a political structure? What about societal classes? Often times, when young students are asked to create their Utopia, they limit themselves to the geographical landscape and societal interactions or economy. Often overlooked,however, is medicine - would there be diseases? Would cancer still be as prevalent as it is in our society? What about other genetic disorders? Please watch the following brief clip from a 1997 movie titled GATTACA... The future of genetic research is an extremely interesting, yet extremely slippery slope. The legal and ethical discussions that are sure to unfold over the next 50-100 years will be extremely interesting. Just because science has the ability to do something, should it? For example - what if we could create the "perfect" human as alluded to in the scene from GATTACA... Is it ethical to pre-create someone through predetermined and preselected genetics? As we continue through Unit 7 - Genetics, we had discussions as we watched a NOVA special titled "Cracking Your Genetic Code". This documentary is extremely interesting and brings to light many positive and negative aspects of genetic research ranging from early detection of genetic disorders to helping find advanced treatment options for cancer. Your Unit 7 Celebration of Learning will be on Monday, April 5th! Please take advantage of the many resources available to you to best prepare for this assessment Also, use the information in the Extra Help tab to help aid in your studying! Unit 7 Presentation Slides (Click to view) Below are a couple extra practice worksheets that you can try as well...
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Mr. Hulse
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