What’s the Deal with All the Frog Deformities?
By
R. Scott Lynn
As a student of Honors Biology it is important that you are able to use the Internet to gain access to important information pertaining to current problems. It is also important for you to gain an understanding of biological concepts. As such this web quest has been designed to allow you access to biological research that pertains to a current ecological problem; namely the problem of deformed frogs.
It is hoped that by completing this web quest you
will gain a better understanding of some of the basic concepts of ecology and a
better understanding of how to research a topic on the Internet.
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Tasks
·
To learn to use Internet resources for research
·
To familiarize yourself with some common ecological concepts
·
To answer the questions about frog deformities
·
To come to a valid conclusion concerning the cause(s) of the
deformities
· To take a quiz over your
findings about frog deformities
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Assessment
·
Each team of four students will turn in one copy of their answers to
the questions.
·
Each person must take a quiz over the findings about frog deformities
1. The quiz will be about the pertinent information
gleaned from the Internet research and answered in the research questions
section.
2. Pertinent information includes but is not limited to the who, what, when, where, how, and how many of frog
deformities.
Research Questions
Explaining Frog Deformities
To help you with your research, answer the
following foundation questions.
Use
the Web sites listed below as your sources of information.
1. Dating back to the early 1900’s, how
common were extreme deformities in frogs?
2. What is the cause of increase in
deformities over the past eight years?
3. What is regarded as an important
indicator of Earth’s health? Why?
4. What causes the growth of extra legs?
5. What is Ribeiroia ondatrae?
6. In what states have the deformed frogs
been found?
7. What is the ultimate fate of the frog after
being infected?
8. How is the parasite passed along through
the food chain?
9. What encourages the growth of Ribeiroia ondatrae?
10. Why should humans be concerned with this
frog epidemic?
11. What measures could be taken to eliminate
this problem/ epidemic from happening in future generations? Explain.
12. How long have frog deformities been
occurring?
13. When and who discovered the frog
deformities?
14. How are frog deformities and frog
development related?
15.
What types of deformities are occurring in frog populations?
16. What
are the potential explanations for deformities?
17. What evidence, developed from
scientific experimentation, exists that can explain
why deformities occur?
18. Which resources are the most
reliable? In other words how did you
decide which sites gave you the best information?
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Web sites you should use for your research
http://www.pca.state.mn.us/hot/frogs.html
http://info.hartwick.edu/biology/def_frogs/index.html
http://www.pesticidesafety.uiuc.edu/newsletter/html/199903a.html
http://members.tripod.com/~ChrisDutton/frogpaper_notes.html
http://www.pmac.net/studies_link.html
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/examiner/archive/1999/04/29/NEWS14124.dtl
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-12/uow-hof120903.php
http://members.tripod.com/~joyholly/joy.html
http://www.usgs.gov/amphibians.html
http://www.news.wisc.edu/9233.html
http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc97/10_11_97/fob2.htm
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/environment/4434
http://www.pmac.net/larvacide.html
http://www.cnn.com/EARTH/9803/16/deformed.frogs.ap/
http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc99/10_2_99/fob1.htm
http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/journals/esthag-w/2002/jul/science/lk_frog.html
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000D5DCC-CA4A-1E1C-8B3B809EC588EEDF