Summary
For this project our group had pick a endangered species and explain how it lives, evolved, and if its going extinct. We also had to investigate how there is so much biodiversity, the causes of evolution, and why so many species have common characteristic. For our species we pick the great hammerhead shark. Our project is in the form of a power point and we have a short video explaining some things about the hammerhead and ways we can prevent the species from going extinct.
Concepts
- Artificial selection - when humans choosing what traits are desirable for a species
- Adaptation - a trait in a species that help a species survive its environment.
- Biodiversity - all the different species living in an area. In our project we need to list the cause of biodiversity and how it became so prevalent on Earth. We also had to explain how our species is dependent on biodiversity and the other way arounf
- Evolution - a change in a species gene pool over time. In the project we had to explain how the all species on Earth evolve. Additionally, we had to explain how our species has evolve through the history of the Earth.
- Extinction - when a species no longer exists. In our project we talked about the current state of the great hammerhead. If its going extinct and how we can save it
- Gene Frequency - percentage of a genes in species
- Gene Flow - If an organism moves from one population to another, the gene pool of the population will change, since they don't have the same genes
- Gene Pool - all the genes in a population
- Mutation - random adding new genes to the gene pool
- Natural Selection - is a process that gets rid of negative traits in a species and keep positive traits of a species that help it in its environment. In the project we had to explain how our species has adapted to best survive its environment
- Non-random mating - mating based on positive traits, which changes the gene pool
- Shrinking Population - Decreasing population of species changes gene frequency, which changes the gene pool
- Types of Speciation -
- Allopatric Speciation - geographic barrier causes a species to evolve differently
- Sympatric Speciation - species evolve differently in the same location
- Speciation - The creation of a new species due to evolution
- Survival of the Fittest - An individual of a species with the most favorable traits for it environment will survive
Our Project
Our Video
Reflection
This project was very different from the ones I did last year. Making the change from math related projects to a more written project was strange. Additionally, I knew no one in my table groups, so it took some time to adjust. Besides that some of my team makes did not do their even share of the work, which left me and someone else to do most the work. Which was frankly annoying. Through out the project there were two things I improved on. First, was my work ethic. Due to two of my teammates not working much on the project, I had to contribute more the project. I also worked on it after school to make sure it would get a good grade. Second, was my tolerance. Personally, I can get fed up prettily quickly when people don't work or slack off. Which can lead my to getting angry. However, even though I was annoyed I kept calm. There are also two things I could have done better during the project. First is contributing ideas to the team. During the project, I didn't share many ideas or my opinion on the project. On the next project, I'm going to try to share more of my personal thoughts on the format of the project and how we will do it. Second is my work ethic. Even though I did more than my portion of the work for the project. I didn't feel satisfied with just doing the minimum. I want to contribute more to the group and work diligently. In the end, the project went well. I got along fine with my team mates and the project turned out fine.