Evolutionary Anthropology for Interdisciplinary Biology Education
Teaching Materials
This is the collection of teaching materials associated with the book Evolutionary anthropolg for interdisciplinary biology education.
Below, you can explore teaching materials by chapter, subject area, learning goal and other keywords.
“Fair” does not always mean the same thing
These lesson materials introduce students to issues of fairness and various interpretations of it. Reflecting on results of a cross-cultural experiment with children, students discuss how we can use our understandings to create a more fair world.
Analyzing social-ecological systems
In this lesson, students analyze a select real-world social-ecological system by looking at factors of the resource(s) and ecosystem, resource user behaviors, and governance, to develop recommendations for improving the sustainable management of the resource.
Backwards Brain Bicycle
This video is about a bicycle that works differently than normal bicycles, and how challenging it is for our minds to learn how to ride this new bicycle.
Blackboard materials: Causal maps on human evolution
Materials for constructing causal maps about the evolution of human traits on the blackboard
Born good? Babies help unlock the origins of morality
Can infants already distinguish between what is morally right and wrong? This video explores experiments with babies to answer these questions.
Causal mapping
Causal mapping helps us reflect on the interdependent relationships within complex systems
Causal maps on the evolution of human traits
All causal maps on human evolution in one Google slide file
Causes of our moral intuitions
In this lesson students explore the causes of our moral intuitions with the help of a sorting activity and reflection questions.
Chimps or children – who is better at sharing resources?
A comparative behavioral research experiment exploring the abilities of chimpanzees and of children to cooperate around a shared resource.
Climate Change Game
A cooperation game that lets students experience some of the challenges of cooperation in addressing global climate change
Collective Action Puzzle Game
A group game that lets students experience the dilemma between self-interest and collective interest when groups have to work together to achieve shared goals.
Commons game
In a classroom simulation game with changing conditions students develop strategies for the use of a common resource so that the profit for the entire group is maximized.
Constructing a phylogenetic tree of languages
In this lesson, students use linguistic data (word similarities between languages) to reconstruct a phylogenetic tree of related languages and use the tree to infer the specific relationships between languages.
Cooperative foraging
Information and teaching resources on cooperative foraging in human evolution
Cultural evolution
Teaching resources and information about cultural evolution
Cultural evolution (lesson plan)
Students explore the concept of cultural evolution by comparing it to genetic evolution based on a number of concepts, and explore why cultural evolution is so important in our species.
Cumulative culture
Teaching resources and information about the evolution of cumulative culture
Discussion guide about moral issues
Lesson plan and worksheets to apply understandings of moral psychology in classroom discussions about ethical issues
DNA-V
Psychologists Louise Hayes and Joseph Ciarocchi have developed the DNA-V model. It contains the metaphors of the “Discoverer“, “Noticer“, “Advisor” and the “Valuer”, to help humans be aware of, make use of, and practice different skills towards valued living.
Embracing Complexity
A guide to exploring the mind in educational settings through evolutionary and behavioral science
Exploring the Design Principles for Cooperation
Students explore the principles that allow groups to work together and achieve common goals, applying them to the groups that they are a part of or care about.
Exploring values
This lesson is about exploring the concept of values with students and having them identify and reflect on what they personally value, or what makes their life meaningful.
Fast and slow thinking
Teaching resources and information about the evolution of fast and slow thinking
Fast thinking or slow thinking
In this lesson students sort their own experience of thinking into fast and slow processes. Based on this, they come to understand that our thinking is shaped through experience such that things we do often and regularly become easier over time.
Function of cognitive biases
In this lesson students learn about the concept of cognitive biases as well as a number of important cognitive biases that may affect our well-being and social interactions, identify their causes in evolutionary history, their functions, and reflect on how to cope with cognitive biases.
Game theory: Ultimatum and Dictator game
A set of behavioral experiments across cultures that explore the human sense of fairness.
Handout: Introduction to causal maps with the example of upright walking
A handout that introduces students to the causal map to map the evolution and development of traits, with the example of upright walking
Honeybee Democracy
Students explore how a honeybee swarm makes a decision about their future nesting site, and explore the similarities and differences to how human groups make decisions.
Human evolution – Emotions
Teaching resourcen and information for exploring the evolution of emotions
Human evolution – Human needs, values, and wellbeing
Classroom resources for exploring (the evolution of) human needs, values, and well-being
Human evolution – Life in groups
Teaching resources and information about origins of human adapatations to life in groups
Human evolution – Life with other groups
Teaching resources and information about the impact of intergroup cooperation and competition in human evolution
Human evolution – Symbols and language
Teaching resources and information about the evolution of human language and symbolic thinking
Interpreting emotions sorting activity (Slides)
In this activity students sort a range of examples of emotions into a matrix of good-bad and mild-intense. There are no right or wrong answers (or rather all answers are correct) since this is about their personal experience.
Introduction to social dilemmas and the payoff matrix
Students reflect on the causes and consequences of human behaviors in situations of social interactions, and are introduced to the payoff matrix as a helpful tool to represent motivations and outcomes of behaviors.
Life in groups and conflict resolution
A reading text about the challenges of life in groups and how groups across biology have found ways to solve these challenges.
Lost wallet study
A behavioral experiment across 40 countries that explored human motivations to return lost wallets to their owner
Mismatch
Teaching resources and information for learning about the concept of evolutionary mismatch in human behavior and its potential role in sustainable development
Mismatch? (lesson plan)
Students learn about the concept of evolutionary mismatch and apply it to various problems of sustainable development.
Moral intuitions
Teaching resources and information about the evolution of human morality
Moral intuitions handout
An overview of six important human moral intuitions
Moral taste buds
In this lesson students explore the causes and functions of, as well as ways to flexibly relate to our moral intuitions by engaging the analogy to our taste buds.
NetLogo Collection
The OpenEvo Collection of NetLogo Agent-Based Models
NetLogo: Evolution of ethnocentrism
This model simulates the biological evolution of ethnocentrism in a population made up of multiple ethnicities.
NetLogo: Evolution of resource use and social behavior (monitoring and punishment)
This model lets us explore how the appearance of certain social behaviors can affect evolutionary population dynamics.
NetLogo: Evolution of resource use through behavior imitation
This model adds cultural evolutionary dynamics through behavior imitation to the evolution of resource use behavior.
NetLogo: Two Foresters
An interactive introduction into concepts of ecology, behavioral ecology, and sustainability with a computer simulation of a simple social-ecological system.
Noticing moral intuitions
Students identify the moral intuitions underlying people’s opinions in quoted texts and images.
Noticing Tool
The Noticing Tool helps us be aware of and interpret our experiences and behaviors in the present and to orient our behaviors towards valued living.
Payoff matrices
Payoff matrices can help us analyze the behavioral strategies and possible outcomes in diverse situations across biology and society.
Perception of eyes and prosocial behavior
A behavioral experiment that tells us about the role of unconscious perception, particularly the perception of human eyes, on human social behavior.
Public Goods Game
With these teaching materials, students can be introduced to game theory in general, as well as a concrete method, the public goods game. The conditions and rules of the public goods game reflect the challenge of a group to maintain common resources.
Reading text – Evolution of childhood
A reading text and causal mapping tasks on the (co)evolution of brain size, childhood, premature birth, cooperative childcare and social learning and teaching
Reading text: Cumulative culture
A reading text about the importance of cumulative culture in our everyday experience and in the evolution of our species
Stone Age Hunting Game
A cooperation game that simulates the challenge of our stone age ancestors to acquire food in the African savanna
Three Mexican fisheries
Students compare the stories of three Mexican fishing villages to understand the factors that enabled some villages to sustainably manage their fishing resources, while others failed.
Tinbergen’s Questions
Tinbergen’s Questions can help organize complex causality of behaviors and other phenomena across time.
True stories of people who left radical movements
In this unit students explore stories of people who have left a radical movement, or deliberately discuss with representatives of the “other side” and build respectful relationships. These let us explore the circumstances, experiences and insights about why prejudice, hatred and violence against other people or a group can arise and how they can dissolve again.
Two stories of capitalism
Students explore two contrasting stories about the benefits and failures of capitalism, identify the moral intuitions behind each story, and write a third story about capitalism that integrates aspects of both stories.
What is behavior?
In this lesson students explore the concept of (human) behavior, its causes, and its relation to well-being and sustainable development.
What motivates people to save energy
A set of behavioral experiments to find out what motivates people to save electricity, exploring the roles of monetary incentives, social norms, appeals to the environment or to citizenship.