Description

These activities were designed to develop students’ quantitative skills, and are applicable in both introductory biology and upper division ecology and animal behavior courses. 

Activity 1 focuses on how King penguins locate their foraging grounds, hundreds of kilometers from their breeding areas using dimethyl sulphide (DMS) as a chemical cue. For this activity, students generate hypotheses from background information and analyze data collected using a scaled categorical score of how King penguin adults and chicks respond to the presentation of DMS odor. Students conduct descriptive statistics, a t-test using MS Excel Analysis Toolpak, and a Mann-Whitney U test using VassarStats: Website for Statistical Computation. Students also create a bar chart to visually present results and practice properly labeling figures, in addition to interpreting statistical analyses.

Activity 2 examines how DMS sensitives developed in the penguin’s closest living relative, the Procellariiformes, who have a different natural history than King penguins. For this activity, students generate hypotheses from background information and analyze data from a Y-maze experiment conducted on Blue petrel chicks with either DMS or a control odor in each arm of the maze. Students create a figure, conduct a binomial statistical test using MS Excel, and interpret resulting p-values. Finally, students are asked to draw conclusions about how the differences in the natural history between the two groups of birds might impact their sensitives toward DMS in chicks versus adults.

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