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Understanding By Design
Stage1
Unit Title: Descent With Modification and The Evolution of Populations
Established Goals:
STANDARD 11A – SCIENTIFIC INQUIRY
11.11.01 Understand and follow procedures relating to scientific investigations, including
understanding the design and procedures used to test a hypothesis, organizing and analyzing data
accurately and precisely, producing and interpreting data tables and graphs, performing appropriate
calculations, applying basic statistical methods to the data, identifying appropriate conclusions,
making predictions, and evaluating competing models.
11.11.02 Distinguish among the following: observing, drawing a conclusion based on observation,
forming a hypothesis, conducting an experiment, organizing data, comparing data.
STANDARD 12A – LIVING THINGS
Change Over Time
12.11.25 Understand that natural selection acts on the phenotype, not the genotype, of an organism.
12.11.26 Understand that alleles that are lethal in a homozygous individual may be carried in a
heterozygote and thus maintained in a gene pool.
12.11.27 Understand that variation within a species increases the likelihood that at least some
members of a species will survive and reproduce under changed environmental conditions.
12.11.28 Understand that reproductive or geographic isolation can lead to speciation.
12.11.29 Understand that the millions of different species of plants, animals, and microorganisms
that live on Earth today are related to each other by descent from common ancestors and that
biological classifications are based on how organisms are related.
12.11.30 Understand how to analyze fossil evidence with regard to mass extinction, episodic
speciation, and biological diversity.
Understandings
Essential Questions
1. How did Charles Darwin draw
inferences from his observations
leading him to propose the mechanism
of natural selection for evolutionary
change?
2. Why the existence of variation is
essential to Darwin's theory?
3. How can molecular genetics and
mathematics be used to study the
evolutionary relationships among
organisms?
Knowledge & Skill
Students will know:
1. key terms (see attached)
2. Darwin's two major points concerning the
Earth's life the occurrence of evolution and
natural selection as its mechanism.
3. Darwin’s 5 observations and 3 inferences
that led to the theory of natural selection
4. The Hardy-Weinberg Theorem (HWT)
a. In words
b. algebraically
5. The conditions that must be met for HW
equilibrium.
Students will be able to:
1. Describe what is meant by the "principle of
common descent" and "descent with
modification"
2. Explain what evidence convinced Darwin
that species change over time
3. Describe how Darwin drew inferences
from his observations leading him to
propose the mechanism of natural selection
for evolutionary change
4. Explain why the existence of variation is
essential to Darwin's theory
5. Explain why the population is the smallest
unit which can evolve
6. Formulate at least one contemporary
example to explain how natural selection
produces evolutionary change
7. Describe how molecular biology can be
used to study the evolutionary relationships
among organisms
8. Explain how microevolutionary change can
affect a gene pool
9. State the Hardy-Weinberg theorem (HWT)
both in words and algebraically
10. Apply the HWT to calculate allele and
genotype frequencies
11. Interpret the biological meaning of a HW
equilibrium
12. List the conditions which must be met by a
population to remain at HW equilibrium
13. Explain how genetic drift, gene flow,
mutation, non-random mating and natural
selection can each cause microevolutionary
change
Stage 2: Assessment Evidence
Stage 2: Performance Task Summary
(GRASPS Format)
Goal:
The goal of this activity is to formulate a
question about Charles Darwin or his ideas and
construct an essay to effectively answer the
question.
Role:
You will have a dual role: you are playing the
role of your curious self, and that of Charles
Darwin.
Audience:
The target audience for the question is Charles
Darwin. The target audience for the answer is
yourself (or you group).
Situation:
You have the rare once in a lifetime
opportunity to go back in time, knowing what
you know today, and pose a question to
Charles Darwin about his scientific journeys or
his ideas and have it answered by Charles
Darwin.
Product Performance and Purpose:
You need to phrased a question about Charles
Darwin or his ideas and then formalize an
answer to the question that you have chosen.
Standards and Criteria for Success:
Your completed Darwin Poser should…
 Carefully phrase a question and
properly use it as a title.
 Provide a logical answer; plausible
response for Darwin, that is, the
response states a position Charles
Darwin might take, and is defensible.
 Be written in Darwin’s own voice (first
person)
 Avoid redundancy and make the point
directly and clearly.
 Have at least one citation to Darwin’s
writing or to Darwin scholarship.
 Have citation in proper form (footnote
or endnote, conforms to a standard
style, APA style for example)
 Be otherwise free of spelling or
grammatical error.
Rubric Titles
Darwin Poser Rubric (attached)
Self-Assessments
1. Self-assess the Darwin Poser
2. Reflect: to what extent do you
understand the concept of descent with
modification and the mechanism of
natural selection.
Other Evidence, Summarized
Quiz: The historical context for evolutionary
theory
Compare and Contrast: catastrophism and
uniformitarianism
Quiz: List Darwin’s 5 observations and explain
the 3 inferences that led to the theory of natural
selection.
Prompt: Formulate at least one contemporary
example to explain how natural selection produces
evolutionary change
Skill Check: analyze evidence with regard to
mass extinction, episodic speciation, and
biological diversity, and descent with
modification.
Stage 3: Learning Activities
Stage 3: What sequence of learning activities and teaching will enable students to perform well at
the understandings in Stage 2 and thus display evidence of the desired results in stage one? Use the
WHERETO acronym to consider key design elements. (Where/Why, Hook, Engage/Explore/Equip,
Reflect/Revise/Refine/Rehearse, Exhibit/Evaluate, Tailoring, Organization)
1. Begin with an entry question (Why are modern drugs/treatments ineffective on HIV? Or
how are cockroaches able to survive and thrive despite the virtually unlimited arsenal of
pesticides used to control them?) and brainstorming writing activity (write down everything
you know about evolution). H
2. Have students share responses to the opening question to a partner, and then share responses
with the whole class. H, E
3. Have students write their responses to the brainstorming activity on the board on the board.
H, E
4. Elect one person to write down all of the responses to use in a later activity.
5. Pre-assess students’ prior knowledge utilizing the General Biology Evolution Unit Exam as a
formative activity. E, R, E-2
6. Score pre-assessments and have students self-evaluate their prior knowledge and level of
understanding of the concept. E, R,E-2
7. Have students complete the Conceptual Inventory of Natural Selection (CINS). E, R, E-2
8. Go over correct responses in class to the CINS. E, R, E-2
9. Introduce the essential questions and discuss culminating performance tasks (Darwin Poser,
Objective Exam, Population Genetics Lab). W
10. note: key vocabulary terms are introduced, expanded, enhanced and discussed as needed for
evaluation. E
11. Present lesson on the history leading up to the development of Darwin’s descent with
modification via natural selection. Then have students choose a selected reading excerpt of
Darwin and explain the Darwin Poser Exam Question. E
12. Have each student share and submit the question that they wish to pose to Darwin. As a
class activity, have the students first in small groups of four peer review and revise the
questions and then present the questions to the whole class for further discussion and
revision/expansion. E, R, E-2
13. Present conceptual lesson on Darwin’s research, observations, and inferences that led to the
development of the mechanism of natural selection. Have students explain in their own
words and synthesize original examples/analogies to enhance their understanding of
Darwin’s inferences. E, R, E-2, T
14. Have students perform the Guppy natural selection simulation activity and formulate
responses to the activity. H, E, R, E-2
15. Give quiz over Descent with modification and natural selection. E, E-2
Start of section on Population Genetics.