Research has indicated teachers feel they could be more effective in teaching evolution if they had more access to contemporary evolution information, time to safely reflect on the teaching of the topic with peers, and effective lesson plan ideas for teaching evolution and the obstacles that arise. Recent science educational reform efforts for…

The existence, preponderance, and stability of misconceptions related to evolution continue as foci of research in science education. In their 2006 study, Geraedts and Boersma question the existence of stable Lamarckian misconceptions in students, challenging the utility of Conceptual Change theory in addressing any such misconceptions. To support…

Since language is a biological trait, it is necessary to investigate its evolution, development, and functions, along with the mechanisms that have been set aside, and are now recruited, for its acquisition and use. It is argued here that progress toward each of these goals can be facilitated by new programs of research, carried out within a new…

This article describes the design and implementation of a 1-credit-hour seminar in comparative psychology as a supplement to an introductory biopsychology course. The purpose of the course was to introduce students to the ecological and evolutionary aspects of animal behavior by building on topics that are introduced in many biopsychology courses.…

This study aimed to explore secondary students' explanations of evolutionary processes, and to determine how consistent these were, after a specific evolution instruction. In a previous study it was found that before instruction students provided different explanations for similar processes to tasks with different content. Hence, it seemed that…

Some ability to comprehend deep time is a prerequisite for understanding macroevolution. This study examines students' knowledge of deep time in the context of seven major historical and evolutionary events (e.g., the age of the Earth, the emergence of life, the appearance of a pre-modern human, "Homo habilis"). The subjects were 126…

Traditionally, we think of play as children's work, and this work is often considered trivial and meaningless. However, when the definition of play is explored, its multiple meanings encourage us to understand play as an important vehicle for the propulsion of society. Play has become a hot topic in households and classrooms and for political…

Discussing the teaching of evolution with concerned parents is a challenge to any science teacher. Using the medical education pedagogy of standardized individuals within the field of teacher education, this article addresses how preservice science teachers elected to verbally interact with standardized parents who questioned the teaching of…

"Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution." This was the title of an essay by geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky writing in 1973. Many causes have been given for the increased Cesarean section rate in developed countries, but biologic evolution has not been one of them. The C-section rate will continue to rise, because the…

In this article, I argue the proposition that educators ought to be including a serious consideration of intelligent design as a counterexample to the scientific explanations of human origins. The article first distinguishes between three different ways people ask "why": the Scientific Why, the Ultimate Why, and the Teleological Why. Although…

This article investigates the attitudes of South African student teachers towards the theory of evolution and their willingness to teach it. The teaching of evolution has been excluded from the South African school curriculum for most of the 20th century. In 2008, Grade 12 learners were for the first time exposed to the concept of evolution in the…

The origin of values and preferences is an unresolved theoretical question in behavioral and social sciences. The Savanna-IQ Interaction Hypothesis, derived from the Savanna Principle and a theory of the evolution of general intelligence, suggests that more intelligent individuals may be more likely to acquire and espouse evolutionarily novel…

This article examines what science education might be able to learn from phenomenological religious education's attempts to teach classes where students hold a plurality of religious beliefs. Recent statements as to how best to accomplish the central pedagogical concept of "learning from religion" as a vehicle for human transformation are…

Antibiotic resistance, genetically modified produce, avian flu, and invasive species persistence are just a few scientific issues pulled from the headlines that affect society on a daily basis. Understanding these issues requires knowledge of evolutionary processes. Educating students about evolution may never have been as necessary as it is…

Language is a complex adaptive system: Speakers are agents who interact with each other, and their past and current interactions feed into speakers' future behavior in complex ways. In this article, we describe the social cognitive linguistic basis for this analysis of language and a mathematical model developed in collaboration between…