that the number of questions left blank or answers consisting of a few disconnected sentence fragments was
reduced significantly; now the answers are more organized and easier to read. Performance on questions
that require more elaborate answers (involving more synthesis and analysis) has distinctly improved. While
it is more difficult to see a significant improvement in the writing of the biology majors (most had above
average writing skills when they entered the class), their essays generate more class discussion, give them
experience in evaluating problems and formulating cogent arguments, and give them writing practice.

Just as we cheer our children and encourage them to practice while they are learning a new skill, students
at all levels need encouragement and practice if they are to develop superior writing, and thinking, skills.
Writing is a way of actively engaging the students with the subject. It forces them to more carefully classify
the material and consider its various ramifications. The thorough analysis of a problem is best completed
when the results are expressed in a written form. All of this requires practice.

SAMPLE ESSAY QUESTIONS

General Education Biology

1. Use examples from the voyage of the Beagle to explain how Charles Darwin used inductive reasoning to
support his concept of natural selection.

2. During the breeding season, male antelope exhibit a very stereotyped fighting behavior. Through this
fighting they establish dominance among themselves and breeding rights. Use the activities of the
nervous system and the current model of instinctive behavior to explain how such fighting begins.

3. Your firm Zooeapon (Zoological Weapons) Inc. has been hired to develop a drug for use on the U.S.
Army’s ultrasecret strike force, the Silver Squirrels. These are a special breed of attack squirrel, trained
to scurry into unmanned enemy tanks and quickly chew through the power and communication cables.
The drug must stimulate the squirrels into a fighting (chewing) frenzy. Describe where within the
nervous system this drug will act and how it will change the activities of the synapses at these sites.
The drug will have to act at more than one site, and you must consider the autonomic nervous system
as well as the brain.

4. You have been hired by the government of Peru to develop a domestication and breeding program for
gulls as a new food source for the Peruvian Indians. Evaluate the feasibility of such a program based
on the animal's behavior, feeding habits and reproductive strategy.

Biology Majors

1. Evaluate the following statement: Organic evolution is the single most important unifying concept in
biology today, yet it is only a scientific theory, not a law.

2. There are rumors that the U.S. Navy has contracted with Zooeapon (Zoological Weapons) Inc. to breed
giant attack planaria for use against enemy ships. This camouflaged flatworm would sink these ships
either by wrapping itself around the ship or by sucking a hole in its hull. Evaluate the feasibility of
such a weapon based on size, waste removal, and so on,

3. Vertebrates have evolved an acquired immune response that provides specific reaction to a particular
infection. Explain the nature of this response, and describe one hypothesis as to how an individual can
provide responses to so many different kinds of molecules.

John Greening
Biology Department

Kor further information, contact the author at College of the Sequoias, 915 5. Mooney Boulevard, Visalia,

CA 93277.

 

Suanne D. Roueche, Editor
March 27, 1987, Vol. IX, No. 9

INNOVATION ABSTRACTS Is a publication of the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development. EDB 348, The University of
Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, (512)471-7545. Subscriptions are available to nonconsortium members for $35 per year. Funding in
part by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation and Sid W. Richardson Foundation. Issued weekly when classes are In session during fall and spring
terms and once during the summer.

* The University of Texas at Austin, 1986
Further duplication is permitted only by MEMBER Institutions for their own personnel. ISSN 0199-106X

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