#56309: Mrs. Coulter — 01/04  at  05:54 PM
I have no specific memory of my high school biology class, other than the unpleasant task of dissecting fetal pigs (yuck).

I did, however, have the privilege of taking a bio-for-nonscientists class with E.O. Wilson as an undergrad, and it rocked, even if he was constantly jetting off to foreign countries to accept awards for being so freakin' awesome.

One of my roommates took Stephen J. Gould's class, and it was also excellent, though he was a holy terror.

#56310: — 01/04  at  06:03 PM
It sounds like I am one of the few that actually enjoyed high school biology. I was fortunate enough to take AP biology with a great teacher. We did the typical dissections, but also also did lots of other experiments, which it sounds like others may have lacked. I even got extra credit for managing to slice a planaria in half and watch each side regenerate.
But the other AP teacher was a terrible bore, and I know the students in his class didn't have anywhere near the passion for biology that my teacher inspired in our class. God only knows how boring the normal biology classes must have been.

#56312: — 01/04  at  06:35 PM
Please forgive me for mentioning this again, but it's such a good idea that this is the perfect place to repeat it.

About 10-12 years ago, in an article in Technology Review, Leon Lederman (Nobel physicist) suggested that American high schools teach science upside down, introducing the most complex and difficult subject, biology, first.

He proposed to start with physics (concepts, light on math), following with chemistry and ending with biology.

I would think that EvoDevo folks would be whooping up this idea for all they're worth, inasmuch as they (or at least Sean Carroll) make so much of the necessity of understanding the molecular structure in order to understand phylogeny.

I cannot imagine the best teacher in the world transmitting EvoDevo if the class is a bunch of 14-year-olds who have not yet heard of the periodic table.

#56314: — 01/04  at  06:46 PM
My children's bio classes were inane and some had teachers teaching intelligent design (I am in San Diego of all places too!). Luckily those teachers ore often "let go due to contract experasion". So I went back to school and am getting my MA in teaching. California requires you to have a BA/BS in the subject you are teaching and an MA to teach high school. BTW I finish my Student teaching gig and get my sheepskin in 3 weeks! (Any one need a published biochhemist and hockey coach to teach high school bio?)

I have found that teachers are over worked and underpaid, under appreciated, and are threatened with lawsuits in my school. Science needs to go back to the BSCS standards with the kids learning the subject through experiments and inquiry, not being taught by a teacher. They will get it if they are led to find the subject. Teachers are now more than ever afraid of standardized tests, so they force more "facts" down at the kids hoping they can regurge some of it on the tests. But if you teach the kids to love the subject, let them get their hands dirty and discover the facts, they will get it done on the test too.

#56315: Hexatron — 01/04  at  07:05 PM
I took biology in a yeshiva (jewish extremely religious school) in Brooklyn in the 1950s. The teacher and class were orthodox jews.

I remember how the teacher introduced evolution. He said, "You must learn evolution to pass biology. You don't have to believe it, but you have to know it." Then he presented the subject without further apology.

#56316: Tom Morris — 01/04  at  07:17 PM
In Britain, the three sciences are intertwined until you hit 14. Then, depending on your school, they are split in to separate two hour per week classes. I did reasonably well in biology for most of the time in school, though I crapped out at 16 and failed it completely.

You know that "nothing makes sense in biology without evolution"? Well, nothing made sense in biology class without evolution, a topic that was covered about as much as Page 3 Girls' chests are. Kazim's comment about evolution tying it all together is absolutely smack on. Everything I've read since understanding (to some degree) evolution and natural selection now seems to make sense.

The biology teacher was good (at least, one of them was good - there was another teacher who spoke in a deathly monotone and told appalling jokes), and the chemistry teacher was pretty eccentric. The physics teacher was boring though, even when we were studying cool things like radiation. It was a mixed bag, basically.

If you want to see what 16, 17 and 18 year olds are learning in Bio classes in Britain, check this website. It gives a list of topics, plus sample questions. Whether the teaching matches up to the questions is another matter entirely.

#56319: Cameron — 01/04  at  07:51 PM
I've taught high school general biology and AP biology. The key to both is to not be afraid of the subject matter. Tackle evolution head on. Some kids accept it straight away and are intrigued by it. Others immediately ask why there are still apes around. Both spark discussions that everyone benifits from. I had one AP student bring me some creationist material that she thought I should read, which I did. I then pointed out the flaws in the books (wish I could remember which books they were) and had a nice talk with her. At parent teacher conferences, her dad showed up and we had another civil discussion about the evidence supporting evolution. He was a creationist but wanted to have a real, non-hostile dialogue about our different ways of thinking. So, on the whole, it's been positive.

Now I teach 5th and 6th grade math/science. I"m introducing evolution as part of the 6th grade science curriculum next year and think it will be great. You can do a lot more hands on work with that age group and I think they'll have many excellent questions and ideas. If any parents have concerns, you have another discussion, and if they still don't like it they can pull their kid.

#56321: — 01/04  at  07:54 PM
I only ever heard the word "evolution" in history classes. All stamp collecting. By contrast, the history classes were outstanding...with the notable exception of an AP European History class. Since then, the history classes have shifted extremely into the same stamp collecting mode, with heavy emphasis on historical fads.

#56322: — 01/04  at  08:04 PM
I missed out on the boredom of high-school biology class. I had had a few run-ins with the teacher in 9th grade study hall (bored over achiever) so was not eager to attend anything he was teaching, so I petitioned to take the entry level anatomy and physiology course at the local college in lieu of 10th grade bio. The teacher was against it but the admins said if I could pass the regents in the spring, I could go.

Pulled an 86 with little additional studying and found out college girls really do care how old you are!

#56323: — 01/04  at  08:04 PM
The only thing I remember about HS biology is that the teacher strongly emphasized that evolution is a theory full of holes; looking back, I think he was a creationist who would have taught Genesis if he thought he could get away with it. (The other science teachers and administration were a pretty good bunch and I'm sure wouldn't have let him.)

I started reading about evolution on my own after that and remember how angry I got about being lied to. Evolution really is the string on which the pearls of biological fact are strung.

On the other hand, my chemistry teacher was one of the greatest people I've ever met. He was writing his own chemistry textbook and used us to try out his ideas. And he told the most amazing non-chemistry stories.

I ran into a quip recently to the effect that you don't take courses in college, you take professors. From the various comments it's evident that that applies to HS also - just replace "professors" with "teachers."

#56326: Lee J Rickard — 01/04  at  08:32 PM
Alas, what little I remember of high school biology is dreary memorization. Worse, it was during that contentious period when post-Sputnik modernization ran off the rails because of the evolution issue. (Does anyone remember that story?) I suppose that's one reason I became a physicist.

#56328: — 01/04  at  08:41 PM
What HS Biology class? The last Biology based class I took was in Junior High where there was much controversy over dissecting worms. Frogs were the subject the year before, but worms it was for us.

I also taught Middle School biology for a semester. The text was harmless enough but unlikely to inspire anyone to become the next Dawking, Gould or Myers.

While teaching at a high school in eastern Oregon a few years ago I had the pleasure of working with an excellent science teacher who did not blanch from the subject of evolution inside or outside the classroom. He was dedicated and his course was rigorous.

Teaching is a tough job, and qualified science teachers are hard to come by so it is little wonder that students entering college are particularly unprepared for science classes of all stripes.

#56330: Alon Levy — 01/04  at  08:54 PM
I didn't learn biology as a class on its own before I started university. In 7th and 8th grade it was all (thankfully non-mandatory) dissections, stamp collecting, and so on. At this stage there wasn't much biology in science classes - it was mostly physics, chemistry, and general stuff that's not really any of the three sciences but doesn't fit in any other class.

My single university biology class was in microbiology and was mostly about stamp-collecting, again, but the parts about cellular structure and evolution fascinated me. I still contend that endosymbiotic theory was the most exciting thing I've learned about in university.

#56332: — 01/04  at  08:58 PM
An early junior high school biology class started with algae and field work in the swampy areas on the school's property. The teacher spent time showing us his fossils while he talked about evolution, and he taught us to sketch, to whatever talent we possessed, and he taught us to peek into clumps of moss to figure out what was living there.
One day, early in, he showed us a little clump of moss, nothing very special at all, about two inches square, and then we got out the microscope and the tweezers, and he used the words "miniature forest" a couple of times.
Then we learned about hydras and all of the things in pond water.
It was taught in equal parts from the textbook, from other books, from just plain wading through grass and swamp and poking at stuff, and from stories about how he'd learned things and his collections. He loved the stuff. All of it. From the concepts underlying the subject, to the critters and plants and ecosystems all around us, down to the little squirmy things that live everywhere.
I don't know that it was a course designed to genuinely teach us anything, as such, except maybe in some ways to just expose us to the basics and to get us to think about it all. He spent just as much time on plants as anything else, and he emphasized how things interconnect.
But maybe it was designed to show us how much *fun* biology can all be, too. It was a wonderful experience, and I still have my notebooks somewhere.
I'd coasted through school to that point, and was expecting this class to be just as boring, and it was like having someone set up fireworks on my desk.

He had a particular love for aquatic life, which may be why we spent so much time in the wetlands, and for paleohistory, which may be why evolution crept into every discussion of everything. And looking back, I can see where just the way he talked about it really stoked my love for the same things, even if I hadn't already been inclined towards an obsession with all things fishy.
He loved it, and I think he did an amazing job of passing that along to us, or at least those of us who were receptive.

After that, it didn't matter in the slightest how boring any science teacher was. I was hooked.
It's not my career, but biology is where I find my pleasure. I've seen it as the framework of enjoying nature ever since. You can look at a piece of coral and enjoy it for its beauty, but biology teaches you all that stuff behind the surface beauty, and that's what makes it really awe-inspiring.

#56336: Matt McIrvin — 01/04  at  09:09 PM
Awful class, awful teacher. He was, I think, primarily hired as an athletic coach. I remember that at one point he claimed that the combustion of hydrogen and oxygen was "the working principle of the hydrogen bomb".

At least the textbook had evolution in it, but the class didn't have much.

#56338: Matt McIrvin — 01/04  at  09:10 PM
...On the other hand, I did have a pretty good biology/environmental science teacher in the seventh grade.

#56342: — 01/04  at  09:37 PM
I don't remember much about my high school biology class, but what I don remember is that it didn't excite me like biology does today. And my chem class was really badly taught.

In college, I had a great chemistry class which brought me to science again. I was a chemistry major in collge before moving to biology in grad school.

#56343: Geoffrey Brent — 01/04  at  09:40 PM
When I did year 11-12 (~= 'senior high') in New South Wales, you could choose up to two of four available science electives (physics, chemistry, geology, and biology) for the Higher School Certificate. However, because of the way HSC results were scaled, it was much easier for a bright student to get a good TER (university admission score) from physics and chemistry than from biology.

Further, university-level biology courses would commonly treat high-school level phys/chem (but not biology) as assumed knowledge - so taking biology in high school was actually a disadvantage if you wanted to pursue a higher degree in it.

The result of this was that high-school biology was largely a dead-end subject (geology also, for the same reasons), and my school treated it that way. It was ostensibly part of the curriculum for everybody up to year 10, but it got pretty short shrift even there because none of the bright students were expected to continue in it. I think my natural leanings would've been towards physics and chemistry anyway, but I never saw enough of biology to make much of a choice.

#56344: Geoffrey Brent — 01/04  at  09:44 PM
Er, '~=' meaning 'roughly equivalent' rather than 'not equal to' there

#56346: Tom Morris — 01/04  at  09:58 PM
My chemistry teacher told us a great story to fix Group I elements in to our minds forever. A failing chemistry student at university decides to kill himself. He decides to at least go out creatively. So he goes to the university swimming pool, and brings along some sodium. He changes in to his swimming trunks and puts the sodium in his trunks. He then jumps in, expecting the reaction between the sodium to be big enough to kill him. Unfortunately, it's not. It only blows his genitals off.

Of course, this is total urban legend stuff, and she imprinted on (some of) us the importance of taking such a story with a pinch of sceptical salt.

#56347: — 01/04  at  10:01 PM
I graduated from HS in 2000 and my HS Biology class was similar to many. It was stamp collecting, with an uninterested basketball coach for a teacher, evolution was largely ignored (in Michigan of all places), etc.

But poor education isn't limited to Biology. As my favorite teacher discovered when he came out of retirement, too many (most?) students don't really even know how to read a textbook and learn from it; and too many (most?) students--good God!--even only know mathematics as magic algorithms that can be applied to known kinds of problems.

I would prefer it, if it came down to it, if schools completely gave up on trying to produce educated children and instead just tried to make effective thinkers. It seemed sometimes like the opposite compromise had been made systematically all throughout public school.

/starting to sound like a teenager again...

#56348: — 01/04  at  10:15 PM
I remember very little from high school biology. I'm pretty sure we watched movies sometimes, but it was 9th grade and I had family problems (so I slept a lot) Despite this, I still got an A because I am excellent at memorization. I clearly remember having to know 10-20 different pine cones just by the way they felt. How is that biology?

One memory stands out for me: My teacher was off in his little alcove away from the class, having already set up different stations for us to work at. I was at the station closest to his alcove with my lab partner and I asked "Hey, why doesn't the ice float?" and my teacher popped his head out and said "See, that's what science is about!" and went back to whatever he was doing. I think he meant asking questions, maybe... he was a bit odd. I never learned much about density until 10th grade chemistry (it had been an icecube in alcohol rather than water).

When we dissected the frogs (among other things) I remember the smell being disgusting... and I made a paper sumo wrestling cloth for it to wear, then danced it around with it's guts hanging out to gross out a squeamish girl I had a crush on. Ah, good times.

As a college student with the main career goal of teaching high school science, I have always had the intention of making science fun. I plan to teach earth science, because as we all know, geology rocks. I never got a single scrap of earth science in high school, it was biology -> chemistry -> physics to prepare us for college. What a waste that was. Had my first geo class as a sophomore in college and completely fell in love with it. Not that it was without memorization and boring stuff... but the way everything tied together, and the way it incorporated chemistry, biology, and physics, made everything seem so perfect and wonderful that I knew I had to someday get kids to experience it as well.

I remember being completely unprepared to read or write scientifically when it came to college material. I wish I had been given actual writing assignments in high school rather than "Look up a disease, give 5 minute presentation to the class" or "Build a model of an atom out of cookies/candy then eat it when you're done!"

Some highschool projects that may seem tedious could actually pay off, while others are just so completely below high school level that I'm sure kids would be just as offended as I was.

#56349: Ron Sullivan — 01/04  at  10:24 PM
I had a great highschool biology course -- meaning that I came out of it with the basics pretty much in place -- taught by an excellent teacher of the subject. This was in a Catholic highschool in, oh, 1964 - 65. She was an IHM nun; they had a reputation in that school for being fierce, and taught, IIRC, math and science classes, and one of them was the Prefect of Discipline. (Really.)

But Sister Helen Louise was enough of an enthusiast that it made her rather jolly, and she was smart and engaging. (Her one IHM ferocity was that she hated to see anyone yawn. If she did, she'd have the windows opened wider -- in winter in Pennsylvania. It worked.) There was lots of memorization, but that's always easier when it's coupled with explanations of how the things you're memorizing work, and work together. I loved it. It probably helped that we all had some familiarity with Latin, as it was pre-Vatican II.

I don't remember why I didn't take Bio II, but it was probably some mix of being convinced I was no good at math and having to keep my grades up, as I'd had it drummed into me from about sixth grade that I'd need a full scholarship for college and that was my only chance to escape. We weren't poor but there wasn't that kind of money. Money really does buy some freedom.

#56352: — 01/04  at  11:17 PM
My AP cell biology class was one of the most painful, boring experiences of my life. We had a senile octogenarian teaching what was probably her last year of school. She mumbled through the lectures and got confused with any questions. The book was impossible to read and the tests were so hard everyone failed the first time, so she would simply give the same tests over and over until you passed. This was in a public school in new orleans by the way.

There was no evolution involved, nothing but generic facts about "the cell". Never any particular cell mind you, just "the cell". The way the subject was taught made it very hard to actually beleive that these cells could really do anything or could actually be part of your body.

That is really what is missing from high school science I think. And often college science. THE POINT, is missing. Students memorize endless facts and terms, while never really thinking about what any of it means. Catch them off guard with a question after school, or an implicit test of their knowledge, and they fail miserably. As Allan Bloom puts it, these classes give students "intellectual adornments", not real education.

Unfortunatly for biology the whole ID thing really makes this impossible I think. It is taboo to assume publicly that everyone "beleives in evolution", so the next steps, talking about evolution as an almost magical process that melds order and chaos, the enormous implications for life and artifical life, and all that, are all out of the question. The conversations remain at the most superficial level.

Scientists, teachers, and textbook writers respond with a kind of intellectual hedging that results in making the subjec painfully boring. They go though and try to remove any sign of telos from the whole project. They insist no no its just these cold facts, see, just this evidence, look at this rough ER here, look at this ATP there, we're not actually SAYING anything here, its just some facts, isn't this just nifty on its own. They boringify the crap out of the subject to the point where it is no wonder that few non-pre-med/pharma track students go into biology. The few great biology teachers (like Dr. Myers) =) succeed despite these horrible textbooks they are often forced to use.

This effect is most pronounced in biology because evolution is, as has been stated, the great unifying theory of the subject. And it is a teleological theory, it answers the most interesting questions of all, the why questions. Textbook writers and teachers remove this, and they in effect remove all interest from the subject. Hell most people today don't even know what telos or teleological even means, which shows us just how far education has come since Plato.

Textbook writers also don't seem to understand that reading is not a sheer act of will. Many students, even if paid 100 dollars per page would have a hell of a time reading their textbooks at a real level of comprehesion. The things are just plain impossible to read. Why are they written this way? Often they aren't written at all so much as pieced together from databases of textbook-pulp, from what I've read of the industry.

With so many real science books out there, the need for textbooks as anything other than reference manuals is becoming debatable. Real, readable books by people like E.O. Wilson, Carl Zimmer, Gould, Darwin, and many others, teach far more to students than textbooks. In all honestly I would rather have my own kid read Aristotle's tracts on biology rather than my high school text, simply because he is vastly more interesting.

So, I think the textbooks are more to blame than the teachers, but they are all part of a system, an attitude toward education that emphasizes short-term exposure to de-personalized, de-contextualized, raw information (stamps), over higher, more teleological forms of knowledge. Some schools do attempt "active learning" approaches, but these are often no better. As another commentor mentioned, neither giving vaccuous presentations, nor making a model of a cell out of play-dough, nor running through a list of steps in some mysterious lab procedure neseccarily impart anything meaningful to the student. Education has nothing to do with this kind of rigamarole. Its like trying to build a house by dropping bricks off a cliff in a particular order. I'm not sure who to blame for the current state of things, but american anti-intellectualism, anti-elitism, anti-bookism and the nature of the teacher cetification and training programs are where I would start.

#56353: Leif — 01/04  at  11:26 PM
My high school biology (last year in tenth grade in a school in johnson county kansas) was magnificant. I had a great teacher with a good sense of humor who spoke straight about most sujbects, I only had him for one semester, yet I managed to set the curve on practically every test. To this day I consider the sciences a wonderous knowledge to have and I plan on taking more just to know about evolution and the like. I don't know my teacher's opinion on the kansas evolution legislation, but I'll be sure to comment his opinion as soon as I get it.

I assure you, not everyone in kansas is completely mindless, just enough to make it scary to live here. Vive la Evolution!