Day 10: Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Post date: Jul 23, 2013 4:41:24 PM

Essential Questions:

1) What is evolution? Why is it important?

2) Who are our hominid ancestors? How and why did they evolve?

3) How do I research for the Little Big History project?

Today we recapped Threshold 5 of Big History: the appearance of life. We also listed to David Christian in the Unit 5 Main Lecture entitled "How did Life Begin and Change?" where he talks about the Goldilocks Conditions of life and several mini-thresholds leading to our species. (Video: Part 1, Part 2).

We talked about Darwin and evolution. As material supplemental to today's lecture, you can read about Charles Darwin and evolution, about Watson, Crick and Franklin and DNA, or about mass extinctions on Earth. There's also the second episode in the Claim Testers comic! You can also read about Lucy, the earliest found Australopithicus or about Jane Goodall and her study with the chimps.

We then watched the Unit 6 Main Lecture entitled "How did our Ancestors Evolve?" providing evidence for evolution and our hominid ancestors. (Video: Part 1, Part 2) And, just for fun, here's the evolution of Homer Simpson.

For tomorrow, please meet us at the museum, on the steps outside the front entrance, at 11AM sharp. The museum is on Central Park West, spanning an area of several blocks, between 77th and 81st.

We finished class by talking about researching for the Little Big History project. Your annotated bibliographies are due on Wednesday, July 31st.

In anticipation of seminar on Thursday, please prepare the following questions:

1. How have astronomical, geological, and biological factors impacted the evolution of species from Australopithicus to homo sapiens? To what extent has one of these categories been more important than the others?
2. “Altruism and kindness run counter to Darwin’s theory of evolution.” To what extent do you believe this statement to be true?

We have four texts for this seminar"

1. Stokes-Brown, Big History, Chapter 2 (p. 16-37)
2. Stokes-Brown, Big History, Chapter 3 (p. 38-56)
3. Listen and take notes on WNYC's RadioLab, "The Good Show" (about 65 minutes). In the third segment, they talk about the Cuban missile crisis and a type of decision making situation - called a "game" in economics. For a brief overview of what's called the prisoner's dilemma, you can watch this supplementary video that explains the process in a bit more clarity.
4. Listen and take notes on WNYC's RadioLab, "Blood Buddies" (about 15 minutes). Make sure you listen to "The Good Show" first.

Lastly, here are Little Big History documents:

• The assignment document, detailing steps and due dates
• The initial topic graphic organizer
• The narrowing topic graphic organizer
• Little Big History Thresholds Graphic Organizer
• Here is an anchor for the annotated bibliography.
• Here is the graphic organizer for the annotated bibliography (due Wed, July 31)
• This is a guide to different kinds of sources and how to cite them for your bibliography.
• Here is a guide to footnotes (what they are and how to use them)
• A guide to JSTOR and how to log in and search for articles
• An initial list of possible text sources you can use for the project if you're feeling stuck
• A graphic organizer to help you write your conclusion to the LBH project.
• Here is the Little Big History rubric for 2013, off of which you will be assessed.