American Genesis: The Evolution Controversies from Scopes to Creation Science

Transformations: Approaches to College Science Teaching. By Deborah Allen and Kimberly D. Tanner. 2009. W.H. Freeman. (ISBN 9781429253352). 284 pp. Cloth. $21.95. Can we model scientific practice better through conscientious course design and lecture strategies? Transformations is an up-to-date source book that addresses this question with teaching ideas drawn from the primary literature of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) and accumulated teacher lore in biology. This book starts from the uncontroversial premise that more active-learning approaches will promote learning in biology courses, but extends this premise toward course engagement and self-reflection about how we interact with our students. The authors have reprinted a series of features they published in CBE--Life Sciences Education. These features, arranged thematically, are intended to be used as independent segments for faculty who want to tool up on particular topics or practices. The volume opens with seven techniques for boosting active learning in lectures, briefly introduced in order of increasing prep time for the instructor. Several of these techniques--especially problem-based learning (PBL), peer-teaching, and cooperative learning--are elaborated upon in later chapters. The second group of chapters outlines ideas about course design, assessment, and content standards, and the reader is directed to more in-depth sources on those topics. For me, some of the most interesting ideas were from the section about student engagement, particularly the chapters about developing cultural competence as well as the practice of framing scientific content with historical or cultural perspectives in order to engage students. Their discussion of cultural competency offered starting points for faculty to self-reflect about our attitudes when working with students whose backgrounds differ from our own. Some of the practices introduced there may stop students from underrepresented groups from switching away from science because they don't see themselves as belonging to the scientific culture. The final chapters emphasize teaching scientists' ongoing development in scientific education. Many of these ideas are attainable by a single faculty member, such as exploring the literature of SoTL or developing partnerships with teachers in P-12 settings. Some chapters are more polemical in nature, particularly in regard to developing the teaching skills of biology graduate students as a systematic element of their training. Surprisingly, offices of teaching and learning that are dedicated to faculty development get no mention in this section. …