Review for:Biology Labs-Online

posted: on June 11, 2007 at 6:08PM

Biology

Evolution

I wanted students to understand the priciples of microevolution from a genetic drift and natural selection standpoints.

A.P., Honors or Advanced

Students worked in pairs and went through a series of simulations that monitered the effects of genectic drift and natural selection on populations. The watched how allele frequecies changed and hypothesized on why they were chang.ing

Provides visualization or animation, Increases modeling skills, Provides access to data sets, Provides a virtual lab, Provides additional content

This is a great tool to healp students vsualize evolution. This is a hard topic to model succesfully, but this lab can calculate several generations and hlep studens grasp the time scale of evolution. The graphs and data are also availible to use in anaylysis. It was easy to use in class on our tablet computers. I purchased 10 student copies that were good for a year. I created and managed all the accounts which prevented the students from losing information. I also didn't want to make them buy a site license for a lab they might only use once or twice. With the ten copies I had, I could have my AP Biology, Honors Biology, and an evolution seminar all using the site licenses. The simulations in the student manual are good, but you can also write your own.

There were very few weaknesses with this site. My students really enjoyed using the program.