Hi,
I recently wrote up a brief summary of a TBL class period for another
group. The topic was applying evolutionary thinking to medical questions.
It was for an evolution class but could work for a variety of biology or
medical classes, including medical anthropology. I used the Evo-ed site's
slides for Lactase persistence and a freely available review article. See
the description below. This was not my finest class period, but it worked
pretty well and was fun!
Hope to hear from others using TBL in similar classes...
Heather
*Team-Based Learning Module*
*Applying Evolutionary Methods to Medical Problems: The case of Lactose
Intolerance*
Heather Lerner’s[1] <#_ftn1> lesson plan using resources from the evo-ed
site[2] <#_ftn2>
March 18, 2015
*Learning Goals *
· Apply evolutionary thinking to a modern medical problem
o Distinguish between proximate questions and evolutionary questions
o Pose at least one proximate question
o Pose at least one evolutionary question of each type
§ Phylogenetic
§ Adaptive significance
*Pre-class reading: *Nesse, Randolph M., and Stephen C. Stearns. "The great
opportunity: evolutionary applications to medicine and public health."
*Evolutionary
Applications* 1.1 (2008): 28-48. *Freely available
<http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1752-4571.2007.00006.x/epdf>[3]
<#_ftn3>*
*Pre-class reading guide:* usually I have a list of questions for students
to answer when reading a paper, but I haven’t yet developed a formal one
for this. I asked them simply to focus on the tables because they provide a
framework for organizing evolutionary methods/questions.
*In class (50 minutes, 80 would be better, of course!)*
*A. **Introduce the lactose situation (this is basically a warm-up)*
• We give each Heather (our class has two Heathers, one is
lactose-intolerant, and she was prepared ahead-of-time to answer questions
about her reaction to dairy products) a large milk shake.
• About 20 minutes later, one Heather is prancing around, full of
energy
• The other Heather is cramped up in the bathroom.
*B. **Ask the class (or teams, depending on the size of your class): *What
happened? (encourage students to get as deep into it as they can…why is
she cramping, what is happening in her intestines? Why? What kinds of
questions are you asking/answering here? *Likely these are all proximate.)*
C. *Each team, write up the two most important SPECIFIC proximate
questions you need answered to understand what is happening (*I skipped
this part because I have a 50 minute class that talks a lot! And, this is
an upper-level evolutionary biology class where I wanted to focus on
evolutionary questions)
a. Expect questions about the cellular mechanisms that underlie lactose
tolerance versus intolerance
D. *Describe the cellular biology of lactase persistence* (Evo-ed slides
5-17 or some subset depending on the amount of time available)
E. *Ask the teams to pose the two most important evolutionary questions
they need to answer to better understand this situation* (I try not to use
problem or condition, so as not to alienate the lactose-intolerant students)
a. *Team 1 asked (primarily phylogenetic questions) *
i. Which populations of
humans have lactose tolerance (What are their cultures and diets like?) and
ii. What is the timeframe
of evolution of lactose tolerance in these populations (compare timeframe
of domestication of mammals, migration lines of humans and relatedness
using microsatellites)
b. *Team 2 asked (primarily adaptive significance questions)*
i. Are there any
trade-offs for maintaining lactose-tolerance as adults?
1. I asked them to brainstorm the pros of being able to digest lactose
as adults in early humans (see slide at evo-ed “how did lactase persistence
spread?”)
2. Also asked them to brainstorm what the costs might be, then used the
slides at evo-ed describing the “Molecular Genetics of Lactase Persistence”
ii. To what extent is
lactose-tolerance linked to the evolution of the microbiome?
1. This was exciting because they got to the idea of the gut bacteria
being able to process lactose, which happens in one human population
c. Ask the teams to label each question as phylogenetic or adaptive
signifance
d. Make sure to answer their questions using the slides from Evo-Ed
(somewhat described above). Or, assign them some readings and have them
turn in a few paragraphs (as individual homework) answering one of the
questions they posed above.
------------------------------
[1] <#_ftnref1> [log in to unmask]
[2] <#_ftnref2> http://www.evo-ed.com/Pages/Lactase/index.html
[3] <#_ftnref3>
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1752-4571.2007.00006.x/epdf
--
Heather
*******************************************
Heather R. L. Lerner, Ph.D., M.S.
Joseph Moore Museum <http://earlham.edu/jmm> Director
Assistant Professor of Biology
Earlham College
801 National Road West
Richmond IN 47374
*******************************************
Google Voice: 949-GENOMES
Email: [log in to unmask]
http://heatherlerner.com/
*******************************************
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