Daily Recap: Friday, 5/8

Anatomy and Physiology:
Today we worked on assembling our 4th quarter reflective portfolios.

Biology:
Ecology test

How bad is it?

Just how bad is the economy? Bad enough that pictures like this get published over at Freakonomics:

Hope is not lost

In a previous post I brought to your attention a small study that was conducted by a graduate student at THE Ohio State University showing a correlation between Facebook use and lower GPA's in college students. That little piece of research, apparently, has generated quite a bit of buzz, and USA Today is now reporting on a follow-up study conducted by a group of researchers that seems to show no correlation between academic performance and Facebook use:

The newer research, published this week in an online journal First Monday, found no "robust negative relationship between Facebook use and grades. Indeed. If anything, Facebook use is more common among individuals with higher grades." Northwestern University professor Eszter Hargittai, Stanford doctoral candidate Josh Pasek and Eian More, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania, analyzed three existing data sets, including a sample of more than 1,000 undergraduates from the University of Illinois-Chicago and other data involving teens and young adults. [...]

In a statement published in First Monday, the authors of the larger study said they were motivated to "set the record straight" because of the surge of public interest generated by the media. "Our primary criticism of the...study was not in reference to her results, but rather to the process of alerting the mass media without probability-based sampling, replication or comprehensive peer review."

Friday News Roundup: "The Friday Five"

In an effort to keep myself entertained, I'm going to start calling this feature the "Friday Five." It's hard work being this clever....

1. While the swine flu continues to spread across the United States and around the world, many leaders are relieved to find that it doesn't appear to be any more dangerous than an "ordinary" round of seasonal flu. Health experts warn us, though, that may come back in a more deadly form this fall. You can read about it here.

2. California's on fire again.

3. One of baseball's biggest names, Manny Ramirez, was suspended for 50 games after he failed a drug test. Meanwhile, the Royals are playing some pretty good ball.

4. The Kansas legislature passed a revised budget for the next fiscal year which includes a 2.75% across-the-board cut to funded programs. While this isn't great news, it's probably a lot better than it could have been. Earlier versions of the budget had included cuts that were closer to 5%.

5. The economy still sucks, but it's not quite as bad as it was predicted to be.

Daily Recap: Thursday, 5/7

Anatomy and Physiology:
Digestive system exam

Biology:
We took a few minutes at the beginning of class to discuss what will be on the ecology test tomorrow. The rest of the period was work time to get ready for it.

Flu virus evolution

Earlier this week, The New York Times website posted an interesting article by Carl Zimmer in which he discusses how viruses are able to continually evolve into new varieties, and how that relates to the current "swine flu" pandemic. Here are some of the highlights:

The current outbreak shows how complex and mysterious the evolution of viruses is. That complexity and mystery are all the more remarkable because a virus is life reduced to its essentials. A human influenza virus, for example, is a protein shell measuring about five-millionths of an inch across, with 10 genes inside. (We have about 20,000.)

Some viruses use DNA, like we do, to encode their genes. Others, like the influenza virus, use single-strand RNA. But viruses all have one thing in common, said Roland Wolkowicz, a molecular virologist at San Diego State University: they all reproduce by disintegrating and then reforming. [...]

Viruses are diverse because they can mutate very fast and can mix genes. They sometimes pick up genes from their hosts, and they can swap genes with other viruses. Some viruses, including flu viruses, carry out a kind of mixing known as reassortment. If two different flu viruses infect the same cell, the new copies of their genes get jumbled up as new viruses are assembled. [...]

As new hosts have evolved, some viruses have adapted to them. Birds, for example, became the main host for influenza viruses. Many birds infected with flu viruses do not get sick. The viruses replicate in the gut and are shed with the birds’ droppings.

A quarter of birds typically carry two or more strains of flu at the same time, allowing the viruses to mix their genes into a genetic blur. “Birds are constantly mixing up the constellation of these viruses,” said David Spiro of the J. Craig Venter Institute.

From birds, flu viruses have moved to animals [sic], including pigs, horses and humans. Other viruses, like H.I.V. and SARS, have also managed to jump into our species, but many others have failed. [...]

Only a few strains of influenza have managed to become true human viruses in the past century. To make the transition, the viruses have to adapt to their new host. Their gene-building enzymes have evolved to run at top speed at human body temperature, for example, which is a few degrees cooler than a bird’s.

Influenza viruses also moved from bird guts to human airways. That shift also required flu viruses to spread in a new way: in the droplets we release in our coughs and sneezes. [...]

Up to a fifth of all Americans become infected each flu season, and 36,000 die. During that time, the flu virus continues to evolve. The surface proteins change shape, allowing the viruses to evade the immune systems and resist antiflu drugs. [...]

From time to time, a new kind of flu emerges that causes far more suffering than the typical swarm of seasonal flu viruses. In 1918, for example, the so-called Spanish flu caused an estimated 50 million deaths. In later years, some of the descendants of that strain picked up genes from bird flu viruses.

Sometimes reassortments led to new pandemics. It is possible that reassortment enables flu viruses to escape the immune system so well that they can make people sicker and spread faster to new hosts.

Reassortment also played a big role in the emergence of the current swine flu. Its genes come from several ancestors, which mainly infected pigs. [...]

In the late 1990s, American scientists discovered a triple reassortant that mixed genes from classic swine flu with genes from bird viruses and human viruses. All three viruses — the triple reassortant, and the American and European pig-bird blends — contributed genes to the latest strain.

Updated flu numbers

The CDC has a nifty new little map that they're using to report H1N1 flu numbers on their website:

You'll notice that Kansas jumped from 2 to 7 cases. The Kansas Department of Health and the Environment actually lists 12 confirmed cases as of this afternoon (in Dickinson, Sedgwick, Johnson, and Wyandotte Counties).

Additionally, there has been a second death in Texas. This map puts the total confirmed cases at 896 in 41 states. Two days ago that number was 403 cases in 38 states.

Daily Update: Wednesday, 5/6

Anatomy and Physiology:
We briefly reviewed the material that will be covered on tomorrow's digestive system exam. The test will be 60 questions...about 2/3 of them will be traditional questions, and about 1/3 will be labeling-type. Progress reports were handed out as a "checklist" for what is due at the time of the test.

Biology:
We discussed textbook sections 4.2 and 5.1 over human population patterns and biodiversity, respectively. While the information covered will be on the test, there were no formal notes.

Name that M

First let's take a look at last week's:
And now for this week's:


Good luck!

Interesting Court Ruling

On Friday, a District Court in California ruled on a case, C.F. v. Capistrano USD (PDF), in which the central issue was whether a high school teacher violated his students' religious freedoms by making statements in class that were openly hostile to religious beliefs. While the Establishment Clause of the Constitution stipulates that the government (including public schools) cannot establish or promote a particular religious belief, the Free Exercise Clause makes it illegal to prohibit the free exercise of religion. The Courts ruling on behalf of the plaintiffs basically says that a teacher did, in fact, infringe on the religious freedom of his students when he referred to creationism as "superstitious nonsense."

This isn't the only statement made by this teacher (a Mr. Corbette) which was questioned. It was, however, the only one for which the Court opined there was no secular purpose...meaning the intent of the language served no legitimate purpose other than to show a disapproval of religion. Ed Brayton has written a nice summary and opinion here. Unfortunately, you won't be able to access that link from school since it's a (!gasp!) blog.

The key part of the ruling is this:

The Court turns first to Corbett’s statement regarding John Peloza (“Peloza”). This statement presents the closest question for the Court in assessing secular purpose. Peloza apparently brought suit against Corbett because Corbett was the advisor to a student newspaper which ran an article suggesting that Peloza was teaching religion rather than science in his classroom. Corbett explained to his class that Peloza, a teacher, “was not telling the kids [Peloza’s students] the scientific truth about evolution.” Corbett also told his students that, in response to a request to give Peloza space in the newspaper to present his point of view, Corbett stated, “I will not leave John Peloza alone to propagandize kids with this religious, superstitious nonsense.” One could argue that Corbett meant that Peloza should not be presenting his religious ideas to students or that Peloza was presenting faulty science to the students. But there is more to the statement: Corbett states an unequivocal belief that creationism is “superstitious nonsense.” The Court cannot discern a legitimate secular purpose in this statement, even when considered in context. The statement therefore constitutes improper disapproval of religion in violation of the Establishment Clause.

As a science teacher, my first impulse here is to applaud this ruling. I understand that Mr. Corbett did not want to give another teacher a platform to try to pass of supernatural beliefs (which are, by definition, not scientific) as legitimate science. This is a stance taken by many in the scientific and educational communities. Mr. Corbett crossed the line, however, when he used emotionally charged language to denigrate the beliefs of that teacher as part of his classroom instruction.

Public school teachers have the responsibility, as professionals, to provide the best education possible to their students. I will continue to stand firmly behind my assertion that this is ONLY accomplished in science when we teach SCIENTIFIC principles, including the robust and well established theory of biological evolution. I will stand firmly behind my assertion that trying to force public schools to teach religious views such as creationism, creation science, or intelligent design in science classes is absolutely unconstitutional. And I will stand firmly behind my assertion that to profess a religious belief which involves special creation in any form means that you have to be able to explain away mountains of hard, well-established scientific evidence...or simply be willing to accept that your beliefs are not in line with current scientific thinking.

HOWEVER...I also will stand firmly behind the idea that a student's religious belief (or lack thereof) is their belief which they are entitled to. How a student sees themselves in relation to a higher power is at the core of their understanding of the world and themselves. When a teacher, acting as a professional public educator, intentionally bashes a particular religious belief for no other purpose than to advance their own atheistic worldview is nothing short of educational malpractice. And it makes it that much more difficult for those of us who are trying to have real, open, and honest conversations about the relationship between science and religion.

As Brayton puts it so well:

There will inevitably be conflicts between things taught in school and the religious beliefs of some students. When those conflicts occur, a teacher has to handle those situations with some degree of sensitivity. It is one thing to tell a student that they are teaching something because it is the position best supported by the evidence; it is quite another to tell them that their religion makes them incapable of seeing the truth and that their religion is a fraud believed in by fools. I think this teacher clearly crossed over the line here, and not just in the one statement the court found to be a problem.

I couldn't agree with him more.

He put WHAT in his mouth?!?

Here's a story for you...

Littlemagette and I were in the back yard together this weekend, trying not to get dive-bombed by momma robin. He was "helping" me mow the yard, and at one point he disappeared behind a big clump of ornamental grass (I hate that stuff...). After a few minutes, I could hear him making spitting noises, so I turned my mower off and investigated.

Spitting is something that, unfortunately, Littlemagette has learned from watching his Daddy. It's also something that his Daddy doesn't try to encourage. With this in mind I dutifully headed across the yard to the other side of the ornamental grass (did I mention that I hate that stuff...) to talk to him once again about germs and manners and how he shouldn't do the things that I do because I'm not always the best role model.

And that's when he stopped spitting and put the blue balloon to his lips to try to blow it up.

Before I continue with this story, I need to take you back a few weeks to Easter. On that weekend, Missesmagette hosted a baby shower at our home for my sister-in-law. Since the baby is going to be a boy, the house was decorated in an according fashion including, yes, blue balloons. I never realized it at the time, but the bag of blue balloons was never seen after the day of the shower.

A few days later, deflated blue balloons started showing up in the back yard. Under the deck...over by the fence...beside the ornamental grass clump (stupid ornamental grass...) and finally a large pile of them right at the base of the deck stairs. The source of these balloons was Baily, the wonder dog. Evidently, she had decided that blue balloons would be a tasty treat (they probably smelled like scented candles or something foofy like that). Latex balloons obviously don't digest very well, so they tend to pass straight through a dog's digestive tract (or, at least we hope so...). The balloons that we found in the yard, then, were deposited there as dog crap.

Which brings me back to Littlemagette innocently finding a blue balloon in the yard, putting it in his mouth, and attempting to blow it up. That sure did explain why he was spitting...the thing couldn't have tasted good! It's funny the things that go through your mind in that moment...most notably what should I rinse his mouth with? Water? Milk? Coke? Clorox? Tequila? Would a Brillo pad cause irreversible damage to the mucosa of his mouth? What kind of dog parasites did he ingest? Has he done this before when I wasn't looking?

After a big drink of water and a long talk about "Bailey poop", we were able to return to our chore. I mowed, he helped, and the dog pooped. And I have another great story to tell when he brings home a new girlfriend...

Just another day in the life of Mistermagette.

Daily Recap: Tuesday, 5/5

Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

Anatomy and Physiology:
We took our last (tear) set of notes for the year. All of the notes from the digestive system are available here, here, and here. We also gave a brief overview of the entire digestive process, looking both at the process by organs, then by nutrient. The last Physio-Phocus of the year is available in the classroom or can be downloaded from the class website.

Biology:
Students were to read either section 4.2 or 5.1 and share information with a partner as described yesterday.

Flu analysis, Freakonomics style

Freakonomics discusses why the flu outbreak hasn't been nearly as serious as was first predicted:

What made swine flu so worrisome was the high death toll it wrought in Mexico. Most of us assumed that the virus would be at least as lethal wherever it spread. It wasn’t. With the virus temporarily in retreat, current estimates show all but one of the swine flu deaths were confined to Mexico, and all but a few of those were in Mexico City. Why? Rampant poverty, for one, which kept many in Mexico who contracted swine flu from going to the doctor until it was too late. Swine flu isn’t much more dangerous than seasonal flu, it just struck a particularly vulnerable population. That didn’t prevent a public panic, of course: the Mexican economy could lose as much as $5 billion before tourism and economic activity recovers.

Today's flu numbers

From the CDC:

Daily Recap: Monday, 5/4

Anatomy and Physiology:
Since only a few students were here today, we had a work day.

Biology:
Each student was given a new Bio-Bulletin in class. On the back of it is a progress report that needs to be signed and included in their portfolios at the end of the quarter.

We took quiz 4.4, which is our second quiz covering ecology. The rest of the period was work time, but the reading assignment for tomorrow was introduced so that students could get a jump start on it if they wanted to. The assignment is to pair up with another student. Each student in the pair should read EITHER section 4.2 or 5.1 and complete a "Science Notebook" reading guide. After both partners are done, they are responsible for sharing the information from their section with their partner.

Flu update

Today's numbers from the CDC:

More from the Google Overlords

Google is continuing its march towards world domination. As Farhad Manjoo reports at Slate.com, the world's largest search engine is adding the profiles of registered users to search results. The rationale for this? According to Google, it's a chance for people to have greater control over what comes up when someone searches for their name (or, probably more often, what comes up when someone conducts a "vanity search" for their own name).

The conspiracy theory, though, is that Google actually intends to use this profile information to set up a social networking service to rival giants like Facebook and MySpace:

If the speculation proves true, Google's plan would be both deviously brilliant and also a little scary. Why would Google want a social network? To get to know you better—and, thus, to serve you more profitable ads. Google has long made gobs of money by running ads based on search keywords—if you search for "shoes," Google runs spots for Zappos and DSW, and it makes a few cents if you click on them. But last month Google announced that it would join many of its rival Web companies in adopting "behavioral targeting," a method of serving ads that relies on a much more extensive picture of your online activity. In the future, instead of showing you an ad targeted simply to your search keyword, Google might look at everything it has learned about you over an extended period of time in order to give you a message better-tailored to your interests. If you type in "shoes," Google might be able to tell if you're a nurse who lives in New York or a construction worker who lives in Miami—and would show you shoe ads customized to your character. [...]

Here's where the social network might come in. Google already knows a lot about you; through its search engine, its vast advertising network, and its many Web applications (Gmail, YouTube, etc.), the company can probably already glean enough information about a Web surfer to be able to tell the difference between a nurse and a construction worker. But a Google social network would add one more dimension to the picture—it could mine your relationships, too.

Manjoo goes on to explain that, while advertising on social networking sites isn't an extremely profitable venture, Google would have a competitive edge over the established sites...lots and lots of personal information about lots and lots of individual users, which it plans to couple with the motivation of people wanting to make sure that their name is "well Googled":

...Google controls a much larger swath of the Web than its rivals. Facebook can use what it knows about your relationships to serve you targeted ads on—well, pretty much just on Facebook. That isn't much use, because people aren't very interested in commerce when they're checking in with their friends. But Google operates the Web's most far-reaching advertising network, so whatever it learns about you while you're interacting with your friends can be used to target you later on, while you're in some more ad-friendly part of the Web—when you're reading the New York Times, or watching YouTube, or searching for a Mother's Day present. By using your "social graph" as just one factor in a much larger behavioral profile, the company could finally turn social-networking into a killer business.

[...] Google doesn't necessarily need to build a social network that you find fun—that is, it doesn't have to build an alternative to Facebook. Instead, all it really needs is to get you to tell it more about your connections. I'll bet that a promise of improved vanity search results will be enough to bring a lot of people on board. Indeed, even if you're not so vain, it makes good sense to set up a page on Google. A Google Profile is a good way to present your best side to potential employers, prospective dates, future in-laws, or your parole board—anyone you'd like to impress. Why wouldn't you sign up?

(Via Andrew Sullivan)

Swine flu update

Yesterday's numbers from the CDC:

Meanwhile, Mexico is declaring that the epidemic there is waning, while the World Health Organization is cautioning that its too early to make that statement. China has quarantined a group of Mexican travelers there, in a move that has sparked international controversy.

Our new housemates

Like a lot of homes in this town, we have a walkout basement, which means that the back deck off of our kitchen is about 6 feet high. This weekend we discovered this tucked into the framing under the deck:



There has been an abandoned nest down there since last spring, and I never got around to removing it, so I never really noticed that a new tenant had moved in and was remodeling. In fact, we didn't realize there was a viable nest there until we caught our black lab (Bailey) furiously sniffing and pawing at the deck floorboards yesterday. I can only imagine how terrifying it was for the poor family of birds to have 80 pounds of canine just a few inches over their heads. They should be pretty safe where they are, though...unless my dog develops the sudden ability to chew through treated 2x6's.

The other problem with this nesting site is that Littlemagette's sandbox is also under the deck, and while we pose no threat to the birds (Littlemagette can't reach the nest, and Missesmagette and myself have no plans to disturb it), momma robin still isn't too comfortable sharing space with us. While we were out there she spent a lot of time circling the yard with a small grub, waiting for a "safe" chance to feed her brood:



I guess I should say that I assume this is the mother bird. After awhile, a second robin appeared and began nervously circling my back yard and watching us. Like most people, I kind of take this species for granted and so I don't know a whole lot about their mating or nesting habits...so I did some quick research:

In feeding the young, both the male and female robins assume responsibility. They feed their nestlings with earthworms, insects and berries. Both parents are very protective of their young and feed them until they know how to fly by themselves. In protecting their offspring, adult robins emit alarm sounds and dive on predators like domestic cats, dogs and humans that may go near their nest.

Evidently the mother bird is the only one that sits on the nest, which is why I'm comfortable in identifying the bird in the photos as the mother, since it seems to be the same one that I've seen on the nest. The second bird to show up, then, is probably the father, who hangs around to help feed and protect the young. (The dive-bombing thing has me a little uneasy, though...)

When I took the nest pictures this afternoon, it was remarkably quiet in the back yard. Typically, anytime we're close to the nest, the parents' alarm calls are easily heard and difficult to ignore. Today I assumed that both mom and dad were out gathering food. After about 15 minutes, however, the mother returned to the nest...I heard her long before I saw her, which gave me a chance to get the camera ready.*

The chicks' eyes will remain closed until they're about 5 days old, and they'll be ready to leave the nest in a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, of those birds that survive to leave the nest, only about 25% will make it through their first year.** Robins can produce up to 3 broods each year, but will build a different nest for each. Only about 40% of nests are successful.

*I don't own anything close to a fancy camera...just a little Canon PowerShot. If you're wondering what to get that special biology teacher in your life (besides this, of course) he would really like a Canon EOS Rebel XSi (or, if you really want to show him how much you love him, a 40D) with a 55-200 mm telephoto lens.

**If you're in my biology class hopefully you'll recognize this as an "r" strategy species. If not, please go reread section 4.1 in your textbook...

On Scooby's bookshelf

The other day, Littlemagette and I were watching an episode of Scooby Doo together. The title of the episode was "Nowhere to Hyde" , and the plot had something to do with the descendent of the original Dr. Jeckyl turning into the ghost of Mr. Hyde. Of course, it involves Scooby and Shaggy being chased around a spooky old house by a ghoulish villain. And, of course, the ghoul ends up being someone wearing a mask (because, as we all know, every evil in the world is perpetrated by somebody wearing a mask).

What caught my eye with this episode, though, was a scene where Scooby and Shaggy run across "Mr. Hyde" in the creepy old library. This clip shows the middle 1/3 of the episode, and the library scene is at about 3:30-3:45...



Unfortunately, in this YouTube clip you can't make out all of the titles of the books on the shelf. But this screen shot shows them in a much higher resolution:


Let's see...Lizards, Snakes, Chemistry, Plastic Surgery, Dracula, Ogres...it looks like a pretty "normal" reading list for a made scientist. But if you look right there between Bats and History of Makeup you'll see...Darwin's Origin of Species!

I suppose we can only guess what point the animators were trying to make...