A series of modificotions to

the clossic children's gome

of telephone helPs students

explore voriotion, inheritonce,ond evolution.

By Ben Seipel

llTlf;:ff ;f".T:Ift il::,ffi$t,H:l'-i:t phing into "The fry box jumped'" These changing

"telephone,/wh1rp"r." messages became a starting point to

help'my students understpnd and discuss the crosscutting

.o"."pi.f S,ability and Change as it relates to -evolution'

Such

miscoLmunication is typically a recipe for disaster' For my

students and visitors at ihe Gateway Science Museum' how-

"u"., *ir.o*munication became an engaging exploration of

.r"Uifitv and change. Although geared toward second- and third-

g."J" i"a""t. orr-fi"ld trips, studenls.of all ages.w€re invlTd t:i*i.ip"t" in a series of ari-based activities to explain evolution a3 a

concept ofstabilitY and change.

crosscutting concepts using Art Activities

In A Frameworh for K-12 Science Education,the National Research Council identifies Sta-

bility and Change as one of seven main crosscutting concepts to provide an "organizational

framework fo..orrrr".ti.rg koowledge from the various disciplines" for students (NRC 2012'

plij. r" order to maket-his instruiion explicit and connected to specific science disciplines

such as biology, pluyirrg ,l*ple childhood games like telephone (also known by many other

names including broken telephone, operator, whisperin! down the line, grapevine, don't

drink the milk) is useful (Curtis 2010). Games help students observe, record' and explain

31LprlllMay 2015

.r-llali:,::-

the coricept of variation in context

by building on existing studentknowledge and providing mean-

ingful experiences. I used cross-

curricular and community-basedactivities because such lessons have

been successful in fostering stu-dents' conceptual understanding of

science (Halpine 2004). Several classic children's games

set the scene for meaningful learning experiences in which

students addressed the following guiding questions about

evolution:

. How do things evolve from generation to generation?

. What might cause the changes from one generation to

the next?.

. What might help with stability in a system?

. How can I ensure stability or cause change in the

evolution of a system?

I designed the activities as analogies to initially teach

and reinforce vocabulary, promote critical thinking, and

explain variation and inheritance as agents

of change across generations. These ac-

tivities were designed and implementedspecifically to enhance and clarify vocabu-lary that museum visitors encountered ina temporary traveling exhibit on genetics

("Explore Evolution" from the Universityof Nebraska State Museum). The activi-ties als^o address the Nert Generation Sci-

ence Standard.s (targeting the third-gradestandards) while incorporating the new

National Visual Art Standards. My stu-dents completed three activities: the clas-

sic childhood game telephone, completethe drawing, and telephone by drawing.

Telephone

had previously played this engaging game.

For this activity, we started with a short, easy

message to practice the procedure and proceeded tolonger, more difficult messages to ensure changes inthe final message. After the message had passed to the last

student, that student announced it to the class. A guided

discussion concluded the activity. Students responded toquestions to evaluate comprehension and to make explicitthe analogy between the game and the concepts of change,

generations, uariation, inheritance, and euolution The com-

prehension questions included :

. What happened to the original message?

. How did it change or evolve?

. Where did it evolve?

. Why did it evolve?

. What variation did you hear?

. What generation of the message did you hear?

. Can you think of a way to prevent the message fromchanging?

Students were able to explain in theirown words how the message "evolved"

with each generation. They were able to

indicate that the message changed because

at the end of the activity everyone shared

with the group what they thought they

originally heard/said and compared thatto what other students said. Students were

able to identify the causes as a well, such

as "Jim mumbled," "Jane rvas too quiet,"or "the teacher spoke too fast." They were

also able to identify methods'to stabilizethe message-"talking clearly," "speaking

slowly," and confirming the message.

Not only can the telephone messages

be modified for length and content based

on the age ofstudents, but the activity can

also be adjusted for class size. In my class,

t'i,ror.ryKeylvords: Genetics

www.scilinks.org

Enter code: SC150401

Gomes helpstudents observe,

record, ond explointhe concept of

voriotion in contextby building on

existing studentknowledge

ond providingmeo n ingfu I

experiences.

Playing the classic game of tele-phone, where a message is passed from person

to person via whispers, is an effective intro-duction to the basic concepts of evolution(Curtis 2010). It is also easy to implement

. as a beginning activity because thegame only requires a few phrases pre-pared by the teacher. Moreover, this

activity was effective in my class-

room because all my students

the telephone "lines" were about 10 students long. How-ever, telephone line of more than 12 students may be too

long for younger students. For younger students, orgarize

two telephone "lines" that receive the same first message.

The final messages from each line can be shared and com-

pared. Then, use this common experience to lead a discus-

sion on the processes ofchange (or stability) in.relation-ship to differences in populations of similar species. For

older students, this same variation would be a good evalu-

ation activity in which students could use their recently

acquired knowledge to explain the processes involved.

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32 Science and Children

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Complete the DrowingBecause the Frameworh calls for more in-depth under-

standing with fewer concepts, it is useful to use multiple

activities. It also calls for students to engage in the pro-

cesses of scientific inquiry include observing, explaining,

and predicting (NRC 2072, p.11). So, I extended the con-

cept of generations by showing how some visual artists use

copies to create new art (e.g., Daniel Bejar's "The Visual

Topography of a Generation Gap" shows how copies of a

key gradually deviate from the original). I showed a series

of photocopies made from other photocopies to illustrate

how variation was introduced into a system with each

subsequent copy. At this point I asked students to make

an analogy to the evolutionary processes described in the

telephone game. My students were able to describe the

changes as variations from the original. Analogies ale an-

other great way to help students ofall ages understand the

complex nature of evolution (Kurtz, Miao, and Gentner

2001). I extended the analogy to demonstrate inheritance

using student art.I provided the students with drawing utensils and an

image that had various sections of the image blocked-out

(see Figure 1). Students were instructed to complete the

image by filling in the white sections without seeing the

original. Next, we compared the students' works to the

original, which led to a short discussion based on the stu-

dents' own observations about variation and inheritance.

My students were able to explain that in their artwork, half

of the "genetic" (or "original") information came from one

Ring! Ring! Science Colling!

"parent" in the previous generation and the other halftheycreated. This activity served as a great introduction to the

third core life science concept in NGSS-thit organisms

"have traits inherited from parents and that variation ofthese traits exist in a group of similar organisms" (NGSS

Lead States 2073, p.29).Inthe next activity, the students

actively demonstrated and explained how a variation inone generation can affect another generation. Telephone

by drawing introduced the concept that environment can

influence trait development. To introduce the next activ-

ity, I told the students and visitors that they would play

the game of telephone by drawing a "message" instead ofspeaking it.

Telephone by DrowingGroups of students shared a table while I distributed the

materials: drawing paper, penslpencils, crayons, desk

dividers (manila folders) to hide drawings, and full-page

images from old magazines. Each student received his or

AprillMay 2015 33

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her own magazine image to use as a source image. I in-structed students to draw their source image to the best

of their ability. While they drew, I asked the students to

indicate which generation their image was. The students

were able to indicate that this was the second generation

of the image and that the original was the first generation;

they wrote the numeral 2 in the conler of their drawing.After a few minutes, their drawings were rotated to thenext person and the original source image was hiddenfrom view At this point, only the fust student to view thesource image got to see the original image. The students

were instructed to draw the third generation by recreating

the image based on the previou-s person's drawing. Thisprocess of draw, pass, and re-create was repeated sev-

eral times. After several iterations, I instructed students

to add a new element to their drawing-a new change. Iasked my students to make qilent predictions about howthis environmental factor would affect future genera-

tions. The process of draw, pass, and re-create was again

repeated several times. Afterward, the student- generated

images were displayed in generational order along withthe original source image (see Figure 2, p.33).I evaluated

understanding by asking students to observe and share

any elements that stayed the same or changed. They were

also asked to determine whether their prediction about themutation was correct. Students were able to explain that,in general, the images were stable from generation to gen-

eration and indicated that the biggest differences came at

the moment a mutation was introduced (either intention-ally or unintentionally). One student pointed out that one

detail (e.g., a steering wheel on a car) disappeared and re-

appeared in different generations. In this example image

(Figure 2), the intentional mutation had not yet occurred.

The steering wheel in generation 3 was spontaneous and

unintentional. This lead to a brief and unexpected-butvery relevant-explanation on recessive genes! I was able

to share my own experiences of recessive genes and red

hair; my grandfather had red hair, and I have red hair, butmy parents do not.

Summotive AssessmentPossibilitiesThis set of activitieswas implemented in a science museum

as an introduction to concepts ofevolution. In this setting,greater emphasis is placed on formative, informal assess-

ment than is placed on summative assessment. Classroomteachers, however, may wish to incorporate summativeassessments as well. One way to do so is illustrated ih Fig-ure 3. Individually or in a group setting, students couldview a sequence ofimages that depict generations ofan or-ganism. These images, in essence, replicate the telephone

by drawing activity. The students would answer a set ofquestion's such as:

. Which traits do you see?

. What changes do you see?

. Between which generations do you see the greatest

change?

. Between which generations do you see evidence of a

mutation being inherited? Why do you think so?

. Can you explain why such changes may have

occurred?

Students could also be asked to demonstrate under-standing by introducing a new mutation and drawing thenext generation. Answers could be evaluated using a ru-bric (see Table 1 ; NSTA Connection). The rubric could be

used to evaluate the formative assessments as well.I

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Below is a sequence of 12 generations of flies in order.

ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi%Potential questions to ask studentorally or in text include:Which traits in the flies do you see? What changes do you

see between generations of fl ies? Between whichgenerations do you see the greatest change?The leastchange? Between which generations do you see evidence ofa mutation being inherited? Why do you think so? Can you

hypothesize (guess) why such changes may have occurred

to theflies?

34 Science and Children

Science Colling!

Recoll ond.Applied: EmergingUnderstonding

Conceptuol: PortiolUnderstonding

Student is

unqble toidentify o

mutotion,drow o new

mutotion,exploin theevolution over

generotions,orhypothesizewhy thechongemoy hove

occurred.

Student is oble to

identify ot leost one

mutotion thot wos

inherited ond indicote

in which generotion

the mutotionemerged.

The student is oble

to predict, creote, ordrow q new mutotion.

The student is unoble

to exploin how the

species evolved fromgenerotion 1 to 12.

Student is oble

to identifyot leost twomutqtions thotwere inheritedond indicote inwhich generotionthe mutotionemerged.

The student isoble to predict,

creote, or drow o

new mutotion.

The student isoble to exPloin

how the species

evolved fromgenerotion 1 to 12

OR moy be oble

to hypothesizewhy the evolution'occurred.

Student is oble to

identify ot leost

two mutotions thotwere inherited ond

indicote in which

generotion the

mutotion emerged.

The student is qble

to predict, creote,

or drow o new

mutotion.

The student is oble

to exploin how the

species evolved

from generotion

1to12, moy be obleto extend thinkingby hypothesizingwhy the evolution

occurred

Descriptionof Criterio

ConclusionExamining stability and change through the use of cross-

curricular activities such as the art activities described

above enabled my students to think like scientists and

motivated future inquiry by having them explore and

explain natural phenomena. Specifically, my students

-"r" "rrg"g"d in scientific processes of observation and

interaction with a system while having fun' My students

Ben Setp el (bseipel@mail.csuchico'edu) is on assistant

professir in the School ofEducation at California State

IJifuersiiy in Clico, Califomna, He is also a oolunteer

docent at the Gateway Sctence Museum'

References

and visitors stated that they were grateful

for the opportunity. More importantly, they

indicated that the activities fostered deeper

understanding of core content (evolution),

made connections to other disciplines such

as art, and built community in the class-

room/group through required collabo-

Curtis, A.D. 2010. A lesson on evolution ond noturql

selection. The American Biology Teocher 72

(2): 110-113.

Holpine, S.M. 2004.

lntroducing moleculor

visuolizotion to Primoryschools in Colifornio:

The STArt! Teoching

science through

ort progrom.

ration and communication. Evaluative

tasks such as discussion and question-

ing validated their claims of learn-

ing and engagement. I

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