Charles Darwin and HMS Beagle
G.R.A.S.P.S.
Goal: To present Charles Darwin's Beagle voyage to middle school in an attempt to answer one of the most significant questions in science - where did we come from?
Role: You are a scientist attempting to teach middle school students about Charles Darwin and evolution.
Audience: Your audience is middle school students that is the reason why you have to be careful with your scientific literacy (language). Level of your presentations should be neither too advanced and complicated or academically poor.
Situation: The challenge involves; gathering information and understand what happened in the past and creating a relationship between the Beagle voyage and evolution.
Product: You have the freedom to create a four-minute presentation in any style you would like. For example:
A powerpoint presentation,
Google Slides
Hrad copy poster
Flier
A role play
short video
A rap song or any other type
Artwork with a powerful and a meaningful message to our context.
Prepare a powerful speech
Standards and expectations:
The student is able to:
i. recall scientific knowledge (Can you tell why his voyage is very important in the science world?)
ii. apply scientific knowledge and understanding to suggest solutions to problems set in familiar situations (What factors would you change if you would like to do the same voyage? )
iii. Apply information to make judgments. (How would this knowledge that you gain in these lessons can be useful in your daily life?)
My name is Charles Darwin. My father wanted me to be a priest and I began training at Cambridge University when I showed my displeasure at this career choice he suggested medicine, which I studied at Edinburgh before giving up on that too. My father was not pleased! My real interest was in natural history, and so when I saw an opportunity to pursue these interests while employed as gentleman’s companion to the Captain of HMS Beagle, I leapt at the chance. My father eventually gave me his grudging approval, and so in 1831 l set sail as naturalist on HMS Beagle. This incredible journey lasted 5 years and provided the fieldwork for my famous book
On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection which was published in 1859. I described it as a ’brief abstract’
I had intended it to be longer! To say that it caused ’a bit of a stir’ is something of an understatement!
Today, it is generally accepted that present-day species have arisen by change from ancestral forms of life.
By ’evolution’ we mean the gradual development of life over very long periods of time (i.e. geological time), from its earliest beginnings to the diversity of organisms we know about today, both living and extinct. Evolution is the development of new types of living organism from ones that already exist through the gradual build-up of genetic differences. Charles Darwin developed the theory of evolution by natural selection, which explains how changes in species can occur through variation and selection (see page 184 for further details; you will explore the theory over the next few pages). It has been said that ’Nothing makes sense in biology Without evo/ut/on’: this is because the theory links all aspects of Biology and forms
a framework for study, in the same way, that the periodic table in Chemistry does.
Questions
1. Who is Charles Darwin?
3. How does Charles Darwin describe nature?
4. Who was Charles Darwin and what questions did he ask and answer?
Task: Make Darwin's voyage (HMS BEAGLE) map.
Tool to use: https://www.nationalgeographic.org/unit/?q=migration&per_page=25
