Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T10:07:44.203Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Using Museums to Teach Undergraduate Paleontology and Evolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 July 2017

Warren D. Allmon ,
Robert M. Ross ,
Richard A. Kissel  and
David C. Kendrick
Warren D. Allmon
Affiliation:
Paleontological Research Institution, 1259 Trumansburg Road, Ithaca, New York 14850 and Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853
Robert M. Ross
Affiliation:
Paleontological Research Institution, 1259 Trumansburg Road, Ithaca, New York 14850
Richard A. Kissel
Affiliation:
Paleontological Research Institution, 1259 Trumansburg Road, Ithaca, New York 14850
David C. Kendrick
Affiliation:
Department of Geoscience, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, New York 14456
Get access

Abstract

Museum exhibitions possess a long history of serving as useful tools for teaching both paleontology and evolutionary biology to college undergraduates. Yet, they are frequently under-appreciated and underutilized. However, they remain potentially outstanding resources because they can be used to meet a spectrum of learning objectives related to nature of science, real-world relevance, and student interest. Specifically, even small museum displays can provide: 1) authentic specimens, which often are more diverse, of higher quality, and historically more significant than those in teaching collections; 2) specimens in context, with other specimens and/or geological or biological background available; 3) examples of how fossils connect to virtually all of Earth and life sciences (explaining why they have so frequently been at the center of traditional “natural history”); 4) cross-disciplinary experiences, connecting science, art, technology, and history within a social context; and 5) opportunities for students to learn about teaching. A survey of instructor-developed activities performed within a host of natural history museums—with particular attention devoted to the Museum of the Earth, an affiliate of Cornell University—suggests that natural history exhibitions, regardless of size and scope, can complement and strengthen formal education in an undergraduate setting.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Paleontological Society Special Publications , Volume 12: Teaching Paleontology in the 21st Century , 2012 , pp. 231 - 246
Copyright
Copyright © 2012 by The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abraham-Silver, L., and Kisiel, J. 2008. Comparing visitors' conceptions of evolution: Examining understanding outside the United States. Visitor Studies, 11:41–54.Google Scholar
Alexander, E. P., and Alexander, M. 1996. Museums in Motion: An Introduction to the History and Function of Museums, Second Edition. AltaMira Press, Walnut Grove California, 366 p.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D. 2004a. Opening a new natural history museum in twenty-first century America: A case study in historic perspective, p. 245–266. In Leviton, A. (ed.). Natural History Institutions: Past, Present, and Future. Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, 55, Supplement 1:11.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D. 2004b. A Leviathan of Our Own: The Tragic and Amazing Story of North Atlantic Right Whale #2030. Paleontological Research Institution Special Publication No. 26, 71 p.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D. 2006. Evolution, creationism, and intelligent design: A natural history museum's experience. ASTC Dimensions (Association of Science and Technology Centers), March/April:6–7.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D. 2007. The First 75 Years: A History of the Paleontological Research Institution. Paleontological Research Institution Special Publication No. 29, 135 p.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D. 2011. Why don't people think evolution is true? Implications for teaching, in and out of the classroom. Evolution: Education and Outreach, 4:648–665.Google Scholar
Allmon, W. D., and Nester, P. (Eds). 2006. Mastodon paleobiology, taphonomy, and paleoenvironment in the Late Pleistocene of New York State: Studies on the Hyde Park, Chemung, and North Java sites. Palaeontographica Americana, 61, 476 p.Google Scholar
Anderson, L. 2005. Museums dare to promote the ‘E word’. Chicago Tribune, October 18.Google Scholar
Anonymous. 2005. Museums take on creationists. The Courier-Mail, Brisbane, Australia, November 8.Google Scholar
Bartholomew, G. A. 1986. The role of natural history in contemporary biology. Bioscience, 36:324–329.Google Scholar
Bates, M. 1950. The nature of natural history. A study in the approach of science to the living world of which we form a part. Charles Scribner's, New York. 309 p.Google Scholar
Batz, B. Jr. 1999. Dippy the star-spangled dinosaur. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 2.Google Scholar
Benton, T. H. 2006. The decline of the natural-history museum. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 9 October 9:C2–C3.Google Scholar
Benton, T. H. 2009. Preserving the future of natural-history museums. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 30 October:A43–45.Google Scholar
Breithaupt, B. H. 1996. Museums: The underutilized resource. In Scotchmoor, J. and McKinney, F. K. (eds.). Learning from the Fossil Record. The Paleontological Society Papers, 2:33–34.Google Scholar
Burghart, T. 2006. Field Museum exhibit tells evolution story. March 6. Associated Press.Google Scholar
Carpenter, K. 1999. Eggs, nests, and baby dinosaurs: A look at dinosaur reproduction. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 341 p.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, H. J. 2010. Object-based learning in higher education: The pedagogical power of museums, p. 179–182. In Putting University Collections to Work in Teaching and Research – Proceedings of the 9th Conference of the International Committee of ICOM for University Museums and Collections (UMAC), 10th–13th September 2009, Berkeley, USA,Google Scholar
Clark, C. A. 2008. God—or Gorilla. Images of Evolution in the Jazz Age. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 289 p.Google Scholar
Collins, G. 2005. An evolutionist's evolution. The New York Times, November 7.Google Scholar
Conn, S. 1998. Museums and American Intellectual Life, 1876–1926. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 305 p.Google Scholar
Csikszentmihalyi, M., and Hermanson, K. 1995. Intrinsic motivation in museums: why does one want to learn?, p. 146–160. In Falk, J. H. and Dierking, L. D. (eds.), Public Institutions for Personal Learning: Establishing a Research Agenda. American Association of Museums, Washington, D.C. Google Scholar
Cunningham, D. L., and Wescott, D. J. 2009. Still more “fancy” and “myth” than “fact” in students' conceptions of evolution. Evolution: Education and Outreach, 2:505–517.Google Scholar
Czerkas, S. M., and Glut, D. F. 1982. Dinosaurs, mammoths, and cavemen: the art of Charles R. Knight. E. P. Dutton, New York, 119 p.Google Scholar
Dayton, P. K. 2003. The importance of the natural sciences to conservation. The American Naturalist, 162:1–13.Google Scholar
Dean, C. 2005. Challenged by creationists, museums answer back. The New York Times, September 20, Section F: 1, 4.Google Scholar
Dean, S. A. 2009. Charles Darwin: After the Origin. Paleontological Research Institution Special Publication No. 34, 156 p.Google Scholar
Diamond, J., and Evans, E. M. 2007. Museums teach evolution. Evolution, 61:1500–1506.Google Scholar
Diamond, J., and Scotchmoor, J. 2006. Exhibiting evolution. Museums and Social Issues, 1:21–48.Google Scholar
Dingus, L. 1996. Next of Kin. Great Fossils at the American Museum of Natural History. Rizzoli, New York, 160 p.Google Scholar
Duhs, R. 2010. Learning from university museums and collections in higher education: University College London (UCL), p. 183–186. In Putting University Collections to Work in Teaching and Research – Proceedings of the 9th Conference of the International Committee of ICOM for University Museums and Collections (UMAC), 10th–13th September 2009, Berkeley, USA.Google Scholar
Eldredge, N. 2005. Darwin: Discovering the Tree of Life, W.W. Norton and Company, New York, 288 p.Google Scholar
Evans, E. M., Spiegel, A. N., Gram, W., Frazier, B. N., Tare, M., Thompson, S., and Diamond, J. 2009. A conceptual guide to natural history museum visitors' understanding of evolution. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 47:326–353.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Falk, J. H., and Dierking, L. D. 2000. Learning from Museums: Visitor Experiences and the Making of Meaning. AltaMira Press, CA, 288 p.Google Scholar
Fisher, D. 1981. The world of Coelophysis—a New York Dinosaur of 200 Million Years Ago, New York State Museum, Circular 49:21 p.Google Scholar
Futuyma, D. J. 1998. Wherefore and whither the naturalist? The American Naturalist, 151:1–6.Google Scholar
Goode, G. B. 1888. Museum-history and museums of history. Smithsonian Institution Annual Report for 1897, pt. II, 63–81 p.Google Scholar
Grant, P. R. 2000. What does it mean to be a naturalist at the end of the Twentieth Century? The American Naturalist, 155:1–12.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Greene, H. 1986. Natural history and evolutionary biology, p. 99–108. In Feder, M. E. and Lauder, G. V (eds.). Predator-Prey Relationships: Perspectives and Approaches from the Study of Lower Vertebrates. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Greene, H. 2005. Organisms in nature as a central focus for biology. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 20:23–27.Google Scholar
Harvey, P. H., and Pagel, M. D. 1991. The Comparative Method in Evolutionary Biology. Oxford University Press, New York, 239 p.Google Scholar
Herrmann, A. 2006. Field's leader says Bible isn't science. March 8. The Chicago Sun-Times.Google Scholar
Homchick, J. 2010. Objects and objectivity: The evolution controversy at the American Museum of Natural History, 1915–1928. Science and Education, 19:485–503.Google Scholar
Humphrey, P. S. 1991. The nature of university natural history museums, p. 5–12. In Cato, P. S. and Jones, C. (eds.), Natural History Museums: Directions for Growth. Texas Tech University Press, Lubbock.Google Scholar
Jaffe, M. 2000. The Gilded Dinosaur: The Fossil War between E.D. Cope and O.C. Marsh and the Rise of American Science. Crown Publishers, New York, 424 p.Google Scholar
Jakobi, S. R. 2010. “Little monkeys on the grass…” How people for and against evolution fail to understand the theory of evolution. Evolution: Education and Outreach. 3:416–419.Google Scholar
Kates, W. 2005. Museums answer critics of evolution. The Washington Post, December 26, A22.Google Scholar
Kohlstedt, S. G. 2005. “Thoughts in things”. Modernity, history and North American museums. Isis, 96:586–601.Google Scholar
Lieberman, B., and Kaesler, R. L. 2010. Prehistoric Life: Evolution and the Fossil Record. Wiley-Blackwell, Hoboken, NJ, 400 p.Google Scholar
Lovely, E. C., and Kondrick, L. C. 2008. Teaching evolution: challenging religious preconceptions. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 48:164–174.Google Scholar
Lowry, G. D. 1999. The state of art museums: ever changing. New York Times, January 10.Google Scholar
Lucas, F. A. 1920. General guide to the exhibition halls of the American Museum of Natural History. American Museum of Natural History, New York, 135 p.Google Scholar
Lurie, E. 1960. Louis Agassiz: A Life in Science. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 449 p.Google Scholar
Macdonald, S., and Ashby, J. 2011. Campus treasures. Nature, 471:164–165.Google Scholar
Mayor, A. 2005. Fossil Legends of the First Americans. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 446 p.Google Scholar
MacFadden, B. J. 2008. Evolution, museums and society. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 23:589–591.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacFadden, B. J., Dunckel, B. A., Ellis, S., Dierking, L. D., Silver, L. A., Kisiel, J., and Koke, J. 2007. Natural history museum visitors' understanding of evolution. BioScience, 57:875–882.Google Scholar
Murphy, R. C., 1937. Natural history exhibits and modern education. Scientific Monthly. 95:76–81.Google Scholar
Nehm, R. H., and Reilly, L. 2007. Biology majors' knowledge and misconceptions of Natural Selection. Bioscience, 57:263–272.Google Scholar
Osborn, H. F. 1912. The state museum and state progress. Science, 36:493–504.Google Scholar
Page, B., and Allmon, W. D. 2001. Rock of Ages, Sands of Time. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 371 p.Google Scholar
Porter, C. M. 1990. The natural history museum, p. 1–30. In Shapiro, M. S. (ed.), The Museum: A Reference Guide. Greenwood Press, New York.Google Scholar
Preston, D. J. 1986. Dinosaurs in the attic. An excursion into the American Museum of Natural History. St. Martin's Press, New York. 244 p.Google Scholar
Prothero, D. R., Raymond, K., Madan, M. A., Fragomeni, A., Desantis, S. N., Syverson, V. J., Molina, S., and Linden, E. 2011. Bergmann's rule, climate change, and stasis in Late Pleistocene mammals and birds from Rancho la Brea. Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. 43(5):332.Google Scholar
Rainger, R. 1991. An agenda for antiquity. Henry Fairfield Osborn and vertebrate paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History, 1890–1935. University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa, 360 p.Google Scholar
Rea, T. 2001. Bone Wars: The Excavation and Celebrity of Andrew Carnegie's Dinosaur. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, 276 p.Google Scholar
Rothstein, E. 2011. Giants on tiptoe at a Los Angeles Museum. The New York Times, 20 July: C1.Google Scholar
Ruedemann, R., and Goldring, W. 1929. Making fossils popular in the New York State Museum. New York State Museum Bulletin, 279: 47–51.Google Scholar
Schuchert, C., and Levene, C. M. 1940. O. C. Marsh. Pioneer in paleontology. Yale University Press, New Haven, 541 p.Google Scholar
Sheehan, P. M. 1996. Coral reefs of southeastern Wisconsin. Lore Magazine (Milwaukee Public Museum). Retrieved from www.mpm.edu/collections/pubs/geology/sewisreefs.Google Scholar
Shelton, S. Y. 1991. Forward into the past: A century of change in vertebrate paleontology collections, p. 105–111. In Natural History Museums. Directions for Growth. Cato, P. S. and Jones, C., eds., Texas Tech University Press, Lubbock.Google Scholar
Soja, C. M. 2008. Unscrambling dinosaur eggs. American Paleontologist, 16:21–25.Google Scholar
Spiegel, A. N., Evans, E. M., Gram, W., and Diamond, J. 2006. Museum visitors' understanding of evolution. Museums and Social Issues, 1:69–86.Google Scholar
Storksdieck, M., and Stein, J. 2006. What they bring with them: museum visitors' perspectives on evolution. ASTC Dimensions (Association of Science-Technology Centers), March/April, 8–9.Google Scholar
Sundberg, M. D., and Dim, M. L. 1993. Science majors versus nonmajors: is there a difference? Journal of College Science Teaching, 23:299–304.Google Scholar
Tirrell, P. B. 2000. Dealing with change: University museums of natural history in the United States. Museum International, 52:15–20.Google Scholar
Tirrell, P. B. 2002. The university museum as a social enterprise. Museologia, 2:119–132.Google Scholar
UC Museum of Paleontology. 2000. National Conference on the Teaching of Evolution, October 5–8, 2000, University of California, Berkeley. http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/ncte/summary2.html, accessed 8/30/2011.Google Scholar
Valdecasas, A. G., and Correas, A. M. 2010. Science literacy and natural history museums. Journal of Bioscience, 35:507–514.Google Scholar
Wallace, D. R. 1999. The Bonehunters' Revenge. Dinosaurs, Greed, and the Greatest Scientific Feud of the Gilded Age. Houghton Mifflin, New York. 366 p.Google Scholar
West, R. M. 2005. The lay of the land: The current context for communicating evolution in natural history museums. Reports of the National Center for Science Education, 25:21–25.Google Scholar
Wilcove, D. S., and Eisner, T. 2000. The impending extinction of natural history. The Chronicle of Education, September 15.Google Scholar
Winsor, M. P. 1991. Reading the shape of nature. Comparative zoology at the Agassiz Museum. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. 324 p.Google Scholar
Winters, R. S. 2006. The world through Darwin's lens. Science, 311:179.Google Scholar