Misconceptions Paper
Student misconceptions and the teaching of evolution in secondary classrooms
Krista L. Botton
California State University, Northridge
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Misconceptions Paper
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Student misconceptions and the teaching of evolution in secondary classrooms
Having taught biology for six years, I have witnessed that many of the secondary students
in my classroom hold misconceptions about evolution. Often times, even after several weeks of
instruction, some of these misconceptions continue to exist despite my best efforts to correct
these conceptions. Some of these misconceptions, their origins and some teaching strategies to
minimize the misconception will be addressed in this paper.
Description of the misconception
Berthelsen (1999) identifies some student misconceptions pertaining to evolution. These
misconceptions include the idea that an individual is able to adapt to its changing environment
by changing its phenotype to meet the demands of the new environment. These individuals are
then able to transmit their characteristics to their offspring. This misconception is described as a
Lamarckian understanding of evolution; the idea that traits can be acquired and then passed on to
offspring. A study of modern genetics reveals that only mutations in the DNA an organism
inherits from its parents can affect the phenotypic potential of the organism; that any
characteristic that is gained during the life of an organism is not coded for in the organism’s
DNA and is therefore not transferable. The environment plays a pivotal role in the development
of species because the environment presents situations to which some individuals within a
population are better able to survive. Students often do not make the connection that the
population may change over time but not the individual, and the population is changed through
the varying survivability of the individuals of which it is composed.
Origins of the misconception
Some of the potential origins of this misconception are considered in the work of Alters
and Nelson (2002). They discuss five prior conceptions that can lead to this misunderstanding of
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how organisms evolve in their environment: from-experience, self-constructed, taught-andlearned, vernacular, and religious and myth-based misconceptions (p. 1894, 1895). Each of these
misconceptions can be attributed to the misconstructions our students have of evolution. Fromexperience misconceptions are those that a student acquires from life experiences and usually
holds that mutations always reduce the fitness of an organism. Self-constructed misconceptions
occur when the student hears information that doesn’t fit with what they believe to already know;
in this case the student will make an adjustment of their own model of evolution to fit this new
information into their old model. Many students believe that humans are the final “end-point” of
evolution so they create a model where all organisms are striving to reach this end-point.
Taught-and-learned misconceptions are described as those ideas that have been informally
presented to students through fictional representations (movies, cartoons, and books), parents and
others. Included in this misconception is that humans and dinosaurs coexisted. Vernacular
misconceptions are one of the most common that I have experienced and have had the most
difficult time confronting, this misconception describes the difference in the use of words (adapt,
theory, fitness) within the scientific community and its everyday use. Students describe how
they can “adapt” to the weather changes outside and believe that organisms are able to “adapt” to
their environment in the same manner. Lastly, misconceptions about evolution can be religious
or myth-based in which a belief system cannot be easily transferred into the learning of science
and one teaching is rejected.
Teaching techniques to address the conception
A variety of teaching strategies could be used to improve student understanding of
evolutionary theory and address student misconceptions but all literature consulted for the
purposes of this assignment recommended using a constructivist approach which would allow
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the students to analyze their current beliefs, have information presented that may counter their
current belief, and reconstruct their belief in a way that is potentially more in line with that of
evolutionary theory. Alters and Nelson (2002) recommended asking students to graph the
dominant allele frequency over time for differing populations then use a computer simulation
allow students to see what would actually happen with different populations. Students would
then be asked to compare their graphs to those of the computer model and identify the
differences and reasons for them which would allow students to each address their own mental
model and fix any misconceptions. They also recommended the use of student-student
discussion which would allow students to take a more active role in their learning and
identification of misconceptions.
Other research consulted, including Banet and Ayuso (2003), advocated the teaching of
genetics and evolution as a joint production. Their research report presented a successful
program in which students were taught these two concepts together rather than as two isolated
units as is done as a practice in many secondary schools. I found this to be an insightful
approach to the teaching and learning of evolution and something that I will attempt with my
students this year. In concert with this paper was an article by Kampourakis (2006) that
introduced an activity to present evolutionary concepts through an analysis of genotypes and
phenotypes of the Galapagos finches. The activity asks students to simulate a potential
mechanism of change that may have been witnessed by Charles Darwin as he traveled the island
chains and resulted in the changes he witnessed in the finch population on each island. I will
adapt this activity to better fit the needs of my class and better address the misconceptions that
occur with my students.
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References
Alters, B. J. & Nelson C. E. (2002). Perspective: teaching evolution in higher education.
International Journal of Organic Evolution, 56(10), 1891-1901.
Banet, E. & Ayuso, G. E. (2003). Teaching of biological inheritance and evolution of living
beings in secondary school. International Journal of Science Education, 25(3), 373-407.
Berthelsen, B. (1999). Students Naïve Conceptions in Life Science. MSTA Journal 44(1), 1319.
Kampourakis, K. (2006). The finches’ beaks: Introducing evolutionary concepts.
ScienceScope, March, 14-17.