1.3 Students will be able to analyze critically and apply the major principles of ecology and evolution.

The major principles of ecology and evolution are some of my favorite topics to learn about. One in particular that I remember from Intro ecology and evolution is the idea of the distribution of animals and organisms. Organisms need to disperse so that they have enough room and resources to survive. Distribution of organisms is an important concept in ecology, and the best way that I was able to learn about it was through an interactive lab. For this lab, I even got to go outside! Each student was given the task of picking up pipe cleaners from the grass on Wheeler lawn. The pipe cleaners acted as worms and we were acting as the predators, birds. They each had different colors, like green, blue, and red. We had a certain amount of time to collect as many as possible. The green pipe cleaners were hardest to see. This activity is the one I remember best because I was able to see how the worms that had been placed furthest from my starting point were safe, and the ones that were able to camouflage better, like green and brown, were less likely to be preyed on. I loved how hands-on the experiment was and how I could visualize exactly what a predator and prey might be thinking about. The prey evolve to have desirable traits, like being able to blend in. The predators evolve by being better at finding the prey. It’s a fascinating process. I also wanted to include this report in this reflection because I also had saved the corrections that had been made on it. Here is the link to the lab report. Understanding these important concepts of why species live and act the way that they do is one of my favorite parts of biology. Then, I was able to take biogeography. It was out of my comfort zone because I was not as familiar with these kinds of concepts but I was excited to learn more. This course was much less hands-on, as the course was on zoom. It was difficult to learn online, especially for a course that I was not as well acquainted with. It was very worthwhile however. I had no idea the sorts of topics that we would cover, like the factors that drive our climate. My favorite lab from this course was actually the ‘climate drivers’ lab. I got to investigate the energy on Earth and how reflective surfaces affect this. I also got to see how this affects temperature. It was really amazing to see how little pieces add up to our climate and I really enjoyed the research aspect of this lab. I feel that by comparing the labs it shows how I have grown in this field and how my understanding of ecology and evolution have progressed. The lab report is documented here.