Teaching Functional Morphology of Cephalopods During Summer Course

Abstract

The need for marine education has increased in Japan, and recently, many marine education programs have emerged. Fishes are very popular with children; however, children are not familiar with cephalopods. There is little opportunity for children to observe marine life from the perspective of functional morphology; hence, we offered a lecture about the functional morphology of cephalopods. The lecture incorporated a presentation and the opportunity to observe body forms. During the observation, we used suckers and arms of squid and octopus. Squid and octopus have tentacles with different types of suckers. The morphology of the suckers is related to their function and ecology. The questionnaire we administered to evaluate the lecture revealed that it was varied for both children and parents, and helped them to understand the morphology of cephalopods.

The Diverse Morphology of Decapodiform Cephalopods: A Summer Lecture

“…The many courses on fish mean that there are many opportunities to learn about fish diversity (Iwama, Hatogai, Matsubara, Yamagishi, & Shimojo, 2008). However, decapodiforms, which co-evolved with fish, have high motility for mollusks, and are critical to the food web, have very low public awareness despite being an important part of the ecosystem (Omura, 2019). Therefore, as shown in this study, a course that increases the recognition of various decapodiform types seems necessary.…”

“…The reason why there are few educational opportunities on decapodiforms is that it is difficult to carry out dissemination activities (Omura, 2019), in addition to the difficulty of long-time rearing in the normal institution (Ikeda, Sakurazawa, Sakurai, & Matsumoto, 2003). In education, observation of the real thing is effective (Saijoh & Ohashi, 2018), but the number of possible species is limited.…”

“…often dissected as educational exercises to teach about decapodiforms (McGinnis, 2001). Omura (2019) reported that observation of the suckers of squids and octopus instead of the dissection has a high educational effect. However, many hands-on lessons about decapodiforms are often conducted using only squid, and this is not enough for students to understand decapodiform diversity.…”

“…Furthermore, Omura (2019) reported that the functional morphological viewpoint is useful for biological education. While showing the specimens, it was observed that the squid type swims quickly, the cuttlefish type is mainly benthic, and the dumpling squid type is good at burying itself in the sand.…”

“…There are many species in the marine ecosystem; members include not only by vertebrates but also many invertebrates (Nixon & Young, 2003). However, recognition of vertebrate fish is overwhelmingly high, while invertebrates have a low rate of recognition in marine life education for children (Kishishita & Wada, 2014;A. Omura, 2019).…”