Sarah

Hillier
EDUC 5833

Rainfall and Bird Beaks SimulationGrade 12 Biology

Unit: Evolution, Change, and Diversity (Unit 2)

Curriculum Outcomes:
316-1: Describe historical and cultural contexts that have influenced evolutionary concepts.
316-3: Analyze evolutionary mechanisms such as natural selection, genetic variation, genetic drift, artificial
selection, and biotechnology and their effects on biodiversity and extinction.

Learning Objectives:
Students will gain an understanding of how environmental constraints placed on a population can induce the
process of natural selection, thus forcing organisms to adapt if they are going to survive. In this lesson
students will be evaluating the effects of rainfall on bird beak size over a five-year period. Students will collect
and examine data to draw their own conclusions on how rainfall affects beak size.

Materials:
Computer
Projector or SmartBoard
Student vocabulary and exploration handouts (on website)
Teacher guide (on website)

Simulation Instructions:
1. Log in to www.explorelearning.com
Username: mathandscience
Password: secondary
v Note: not supported on Google chrome (use Firefox, Safari, etc.)
2. Make a copy of the exploration handout (located on the website) and hand out to each student.
If you have a 1:1 of students to computers, you could have students fill in the document on
Microsoft Word instead of printing out copies (or you could have them work in small groups).
3. Once students are on the website, have them search Rainfall and bird beaks and choose the metric
version (has a small green box that says metric in the description). Have students click on the Gizmo
tab and ask them to follow the instructions for the simulation of conditions on the handout.
4. Instruct students to fill in the exploration sheet as they work and collect the sheet at the end of the
activity.

Teacher Hints:
After completing this activity, you could have a discussion with your class about the trends they may
have noticed from the activity on the relationship between the amount of rainfall in a given year and
the beak size of birds in the region. This activity could either be a follow up to a class on adaptations
among organisms or could be the introduction to the topic.
Explore the Lesson Info section of the website before presenting the Gizmo to your class. It contains
student exploration sheets, a teacher guide, and vocabulary sheet (an answer sheet is also available if
you purchase a subscription to the site rather than a free trial).
Under the Gizmo activity there are assessment questions that could be completed after the activity
to check their understanding (answers are included).