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Remote Ready Biology Learning Activities has 50 remote-ready activities, which work for either your classroom or remote teaching.
Our group separated all of
Our group separated all of the organisms into seven main groups, some were subdivided, others were placed in between groups, essentially classified based upon the appearance of the organism. Our main groups were:
1) Four limbed organisms
I. W/opposable thumbs
II. Large land creatures
III. Slimy looking organisms
A. Large slimy organisms
B. Small slimy organisms
2) Swimming organisms
3) Organisms with out limbs
4) Winged organisms
I. Flying
II. Non-flying
5) Organisms with more than four limbs
I. Aquatic
II. Non-aquatic
6) Plants/Fungi
I. Land Plants
A. Tall land plants
B. Small land plants
II. Aquatic Plants
A. Tall aquatic plants
B. Small aquatic plants
7) Organisms too small to be seen with the naked eye
There were a few organisms could not fit solely into one category, the jelly fish, lobster, octopus, and starfish fell between categories 2 and 5, while the eel fell between categories 2 and 3. The butterfly and fly fell between categories 4 and 5.
The pros of our system are that it more easily lines up with everyday human experience, allowing for easy-to-memorize subdivisions between categories that mesh with the expected classification system. The purpose of categorization is utility, and this is a useful way to categorize things if you need to make comparisons in everyday life.
The cons are that while the system makes sense for snap judgements, it is very vague, allowing for more disagreement over categorization over a more specified system. Because we don't have tools for close examination of the organisms, close biological investigation may reveal more important links between creatures.
We believe there is some evidence of nested clumpy diversity but we need more organisms to get a more complete picture of the connections between life forms.