Further Effects of Phylogenetic Tree Style on Student Comprehension in an Introductory Biology Course

Abstract

Phylogenetic trees have become increasingly important across the life sciences, and as a result, learning to interpret and reason from these diagrams is now an essential component of biology education. Unfortunately, students often struggle to understand phylogenetic trees. Style (i.e., diagonal or bracket) is one factor that has been observed to impact how students interpret phylogenetic trees, and one goal of this research was to investigate these style effects across an introductory biology course. In addition, we investigated the impact of instruction that integrated diagonal and bracket phylogenetic trees equally. Before instruction, students were significantly more accurate with the bracket style for a variety of interpretation and construction tasks. After instruction, however, students were significantly more accurate only for construction tasks and interpretations involving taxa relatedness when using the bracket style. Thus, instruction that used both styles equally mitigated some, but not all, style effects. These results inform the development of research-based instruction that best supports student understanding of phylogenetic trees.

Alternatif Desain Kegiatan Laboratorium Materi Kladogram Berbasis ANCORB

“…Hal ini karena sejumlah faktor, salah satunya yaitu keabstrakan. Sebagai jenis diagram skematik, menyajikan informasi yang abstrak dan memerlukan aturan yang harus dipelajari dan di interpretasi dengan benar (Dees et al, 2018). Siswa dengan melakukan kegiatan memperkuat konsep siswa terkait dengan klasifikasi dan kladogram tanaman, sehingga secara tidak langsung siswa dapat memahami ciri-ciri tanaman (Permana et al, 2020).…”

Who’s related to whom? Use published phylogenies and make customized tree-thinking assessments

“…Tree-thinking includes a suite of skills and conceptual understanding that enables one to read and interpret evolutionary trees correctly (Baum et al 2005;Thanukos 2009;Halverson 2011;Novick et al 2011;Baum and Smith 2013;Catley 2013, 2016;Kummer et al 2019;Schramm and Schmiemann 2019). College students often struggle when first learning to interpret the information in evolutionary trees (Baum et al 2005;Catley 2006;Meir et al 2007;Gregory 2008;Morabito et al 2010;Halverson 2011;Novick and Catley 2013;Blacquiere and Hoese 2016;Dees et al 2018;Kummer et al 2019). These struggles may continue after initial instruction (Sandvik 2008;Halverson et al 2011;Catley et al 2012;Phillips et al 2012;Dees et al 2014), and impair student understanding of evolution and how it explains both the unity and diversity of life (Starr et al 2012).…”

“…A phylogeny or evolutionary tree, is a graphical representation of the evolutionary history of life; it illustrates the hereditary connections between ancestors and descendants at any temporal scale (Avise 2006;Gregory 2008;Baum and Smith 2013;Dees et al 2014Dees et al , 2018. More specifically, an evolutionary tree is a nested hierarchical branching diagram that depicts hypothesized relationships among taxa, shows the outcomes of evolutionary processes, and illustrates how life is related by common ancestry.…”

Using DNA Sequences and Phylogenetic Trees as Tools for Teaching Entomology to Undergraduate Students: A Simple Approach

“…Consequently, teachers can use DNA sequences and phylogenetic trees in the classroom. In addition, knowing how to interpret and reason from phylogenetic trees is a very important element of biology education in general [7]. A study tested the use of project-based learning (PBL) activity that was developed to teach phylogenetics for junior and senior-level biology students.…”