Midterm Exam

Hello Everyone,

Here is a copy of the Midterm Exam.  The essay questions are intentionally "broad" (you might say "vague") to allow you the greatest flexibility when answering the question.   If you have questions about this exam then please feel free to contact me via email.

Remember, you may use  any other source of info to answer these questions, just do not work with anyone else.  Good luck!

Due Date:  Please email your exam to me by 5:00 PM on February 28th.

1. (25 points)

Discuss the reasons for the climate experienced by your hometown.

2. (25 points)

Choose your favorite adaptation on your favorite organism in your favorite ecosystem and describe how natural selection has caused the organisms to have this trait.

3.  (25 points)

Discuss why exponential growth is an unrealistic model of growth for most species.  Why has the pattern of human population growth been so different from that of other species?

4. (25 points)

Discuss how interspecific competition can influence the distribution and abundance of organisms.

Feb 18 - 24th

This week I would like you to take a look at the remaining sections of the Community Ecology section from Ecology for Teachers.

After you have learned about the different ecological interactions I think that it might be careful to glance through the section on 4 focal ecosystems to get a feeling on how these interactions occur in different environments.

I have just posted an exercise examining the "Competition in Rainforest Bats" in the Malaysian Bat Education Adventure section of the Ecology of Teachers book.


Upcoming Assignments

Midterm Exam.  The midterm exam (which you will submit to me online) will focus on 1) the physical environment, 2) natural selection, 3) population ecology, and 4) community ecology.

I will try to email you the exam next weekend and you need to return the exam to me by the end of the day on February 28th.  My goal is not to make this an "exhausting" exam.  I would schedule one or two hours of your time to complete this assignment.

Encyclopedia of Earth Articles.  I would for you to focus on your EoE article after you have completed your midterm exam.  Let me know if you have ideas about topics or if you are still completely stumped on how to move forward.

Malaysian Bat Education Adventure

A few years ago several colleagues and I came up with the idea of using Dr. Tigga Kingston's research on the ecology of rainforest bats in Malaysia as the focus for a biology curriculum for grades 4 - 8.  Unfortunately, the project has never made it to completion, but we have come up with a cool website that contains lots of information that might be useful to you.  If you get bored sometime take a look at the website.  I may be biased, but I think it is pretty awesome.

http://www.ttu-mbea.org/

I have used the data that Tigga and her students collected as the basis for a number of exercises that I think might be useful to someone teaching ecology. I will try to post these as they become relevant.

I have added as section to the Ecology for Teachers book called "Teaching Resources".  If you click on that link it will take you to a more complete discussion of the project and contains a link to an exercise using the bat data to calculate population growth rates of bats.

Feb 11 - 18

Hello Everyone,

I hope by now that everyone has been able to get on to the Trunity website and has access to the Ecology for Teachers book.  If there are any problems please let me know ASAP (I am sorry that this has been such a hassle!!!).  The semester is rapidly moving along now which means that we are now getting to the "meat" of this course.  A typical introductory ecology course will focus on population, community, and ecosystem ecology.  

I hope that you are becoming more comfortable with the material relating to population ecology.  Please feel free to ask me any questions that remain.  The last topic that I like to talk about related to population ecology is human population growth.  I personally feel that human population growth is one of the most important issues facing humans today.   I find that most of my students from West Texas have little idea about what is going on in the rest of the world so it is worth taking some time to discuss this issue.  Thus, this week I would like you to look at the section on Human Population Growth in the Ecology for Teachers book.

The next topic that we are going to look at is Community Ecology.  One of the fun parts about studying community ecology is that you get to talk about some of the cool ecological interactions, e.g., competition, predation, and mutualisms, that take place in communities.  This week I would also like you take a look at the section on competition in the Community Ecology section of the Ecology for Teachers book.

Upcoming Assignments

Midterm Exam.  Because this is a college class I need to assess that you are actually learning something.  The syllabus says that you will have a midterm due February 28th.  This exam (which you will submit to me online) will focus on 1) the physical environment, 2) natural selection, 3) population ecology, and 4) community ecology.

I have not figured out the exact format of the exam, but I promise that it will not be too overwhelming.  Instead it is just a chance to make sure that some of the info that I have thrown at you has managed to stick.  I will send the questions to you on the weekend before the exam is due. More details to come (as I make them up).

Encyclopedia of Earth Articles.  I think that community ecology provides many great topics that you could choose to write about.  In addition, this is the section where a number of basic articles are needed so there are plenty of "empty niches" (see how I cleverly inserted an ecological concept here?!?).

Basic topics that are lacking include (but are definitely not limited to)
- niche differentiation
- interference competition
- competition in (name your favorite group of organisms)
- niche partitioning
- anti predator adaptation in (name your favorite group of organisms)
- examples of specific mutualisms

There might also be some interesting articles to be written about human population growth if that was a topic that interests you.

In the next couple of weeks you should start to think about what you would like to write about.  It is OK if you don't feel like you are the "world's expert" because I can help you do the research you need to do to feel confident writing a basic article.  Please let me know about any ideas you have or if you feel completely stumped.