Teaching Biology by Samuel

Teaching Biology by Samuel - August 2017 Scholarship Essay

What is the most important thing to learn throughout one's education? How to take a test? How to memorize facts? No, neither of these things. It is how to think critically about any and all information. Given the importance of this skill, there are a few fields that lend themselves to learning effective critical thinking skills, being sciences, English, and maths. I hold the sciences in a special place in my heart, particularly the biological sciences. There are a few reasons I believe biology is an excellent vehicle for learning to think critically.

First, look to the history of the field. Over the centuries, there have been many proposed ideas and theories, some that become foundational principles to the field, and some that, while logical, must be discarded because they are not valid. A prime example of the latter would be Lamarckian evolution, wherein creatures develop useful features during life, and these new features are then passed on to the next generation. From an uninformed perspective, this seems to make sense, but as the field progressed and the mechanisms of genetics and heritability were discovered, it became completely obsolete from a critical thinking standpoint.

Second, many biological principles are very logical, and therefore self verifiable. Speciation, on a large scale, is the division between creatures into potential breeding populations. If a creature cannot produce fertile offspring with another (discounting fertility issues and such), then they are members of different species. Therefore, thinking critically about the classification of creatures into progressively more specific subgroups can be done as a thought experiment. The names of groups may not match with established terminology, but the concepts and groupings should.

Third, depending on the background of a student, biology may challenge some of their beliefs on the origins of species of creatures and life itself. This challenge, approached in a healthy way, encourages the student to think critically about their beliefs and evaluate evidence for their positions.

In conclusion, the ability to think critically is a skill necessary to live a life full of learning. This is why I would teach a course in biological sciences to prompt and foster critical thinking in my students. It is a skill that will help them throughout their other classes, and also when making decisions throughout their lives.