Natural Selection Screencast/Modeling Assignment

For this project, students are given scrapbook paper and scrapbook butterflies of two different colors (or whatever organism you want!). One of the colors blends in with the background paper. Without too much direction, students are asked to create and explain a model of natural selection using the materials by creating a screencast.

I don't provide much instruction on how to use the technology--I make the kids figure it out themselves (however, I do provide some direction about possible apps/sites to use).

I gave my students three in-class work days for this project. They had one more day outside of school before the project was due on the fifth day.

I found that it was a GREAT way to assess their understanding of natural selection (and pull in some modeling!).

The videos end up being about a minute long--the projects are easy to grade (rubric included) and I actually find them enjoyable to watch! They are especially fun when kids pull in unexpected, creative aspects into their videos!!!