The damaging outcomes of racist ideologies continue to influence all aspects of society. This in spite of the fact that at their core these ideologies rely on a fundamentally false assumption: that biologically there are different races among humans. The source of this fallacy is pseudoscience and historical prejudice, and yet even scientists and medical professionals continue to apply misconceptions about biological race when performing research or practicing medicine. Scientific educators are in a unique position to dismantle the central damaging assumption, and here we provide a straightforward approach that educators can employ for engaging in this conversation. It is organized around four questions that build sequentially and integrate the latest science with a history of the topic: How did the myth of biological subcategories of humans become ingrained as a scientific concept? How has scientists' approach to taxonomy changed since Linnaeus's first human classifications? What does biology now tell us about variation within the human species? Why is it critical to debunk this myth? We provide answers with which scientific educators can re-center the conversation around historical and scientific facts, while highlighting how misapplication of the evidence harms the integrity of science as a field.

As researchers, teachers, and practitioners we often encounter young professionals and lay adults who do not understand basics of mammalian body temperature regulation. Often their single solid piece of knowledge is that some vertebrates (mammals and birds) are warm-blooded and some (fish, amphibians, and reptile) are cold-blooded, which is incorrect. There are many thermal capabilities and regulatory strategies. We provide basics of body temperature regulation, including definitions, its evolution, examples of body temperature variability, unique examples of hibernation and torpor, and we explain how a better understanding benefits individuals in personal and professional lives. We suggest a simple replacement of the warm-blooded paradigm that can be used to inform even young students. As a starting point, students young and old are familiar with species of mammals (e.g., platypus and opossums) that do not maintain as constant or as warm of a body temperature as humans and dogs. Students also know that humans do not maintain a constant body temperature over time (they have a “temperature” when sick) or all part of their body (they have cold hands and feet outside in winter).

Genetics plays an increasing role in modern life as evidenced by the development of revolutionary techniques such as CRISPR-based genome editing and the rise of personalized genome services. However, genetics is difficult to learn; known issues include its abstract nature, different scales, and technical language. Pedigree analysis is a convergence of these concepts, requiring use of multiple symbolic scales and understanding the relationships and nature of alleles, genes, and chromosomes. To measure student understanding of these concepts, as well as support biology educational reform toward student-centered instruction, we developed a formative assessment to provide reliable and valid evidence of student understanding, learning, and misconceptions for pedigree analysis. Nine multiple choice items targeted to four learning objectives were developed in an iterative process with faculty and student input. We designed distractor answers to capture common student misconceptions and deployed a novel statistical technique to assess the congruence of distractor language with targeted misconceptions. Psychometric analysis showed the instrument provides valid and reliable data and has utility to measure normalized learning gains. Finally, we employed cross-tabulation and distractor progression to identify several stable misconceptions that can be targeted for instructional intervention.

A simple homemade greenhouse was constructed as a part of the high school project during the learning-from-home period. The greenhouse was used to show CO₂ absorption by Sansevieria trifasciata during the night, obeying Fick's law of diffusion, while the CO₂ emission by the medium used to grow the plant does not. Although other plants can be used for this purpose, the use of Sansevieria is interesting and offers certain advantages because it absorbs CO₂ during the night. The project could also provide a simple tool for high school students to investigate the absorption and emission of CO₂ from home or in laboratory. Extension of this project to investigate the effect of plant respiration on the environmental parameters, such as decreasing temperature and increasing humidity, is also possible.

Many students become overwhelmed when asked to design and conduct their own unique experiments. To assist with this problem, I implemented an interdisciplinary, place-based unit where students are guided in the development of their own scientific questions and experiments around the phenomenon of maple syrup production. Students learn about the science of maple syrup production, design experiments, collect and analyze data, draw conclusions, and share their findings with the school community. This project has myriad opportunities for students to engage in problem solving, teamwork, and inquiry.

Plastic debris in aquatic and marine environments often breaks up into fragments that are smaller than 5 millimeters, which are then classified as microplastics. While there is not yet a standardized and validated methodology for characterizing microplastics, the protocol developed in this study uses methods for isolating and observing microplastics and for the investigation of how they interact with organisms present in biofilms from urban waterways. Project-based learning (PBL) has been proven to be a successful strategy in K–12 science education; the implementation of PBL provides opportunities for student-driven inquiry and provides teachers with a means to integrate curriculum with current research and to consider the effects of human impacts on the environment. This paper describes the protocol developed for high school teachers to educate students about microplastics and how to successfully isolate and observe them. Teachers and students in Maryland successfully isolated microplastics from biofilm samples from the Inner Harbor, Baltimore, Maryland, and shared their results. International teachers and students in Barcelona, Spain, involved in a related project, had similar results and shared experiences through images, video, and online meetings. These collaborations provide important opportunities for student-driven inquiry and for them to engage in methods of current scientific research.

Through the artistic planning tool known to comic book artists and animators as storyboarding, students will embark on comic book–style adventures to plan, describe, and visualize the complex life of genes through the non-Mendelian concept of epistasis. Using storyboard templates, conceptual layouts, sketch booking, and cut-out genetic elements, students will construct their interpretation of the gene-gene interactions of epistasis. The incomplete story of the epistasis of human eye color will serve as the theme for this storyboard, which will also become its own assessment tool, inviting educators into a realm of a true STEAM experience.

Students working in groups experience positive outcomes in both academic and affective domains. Well-functioning groups contribute to a robust, active-learning classroom community. The literature contains a vast assortment of methods for the formation of student groups; nonetheless, the formation and evaluation of student groups formed by various methods continue to be valuable topics for research and discussion. Here we describe the mutual preference method (MPM), a novel procedure for group formation that pairs students based on a list of preferred collaborators that each student generates. The MPM is a unique approach to group formation meant to capitalize on existing student social structures, increase metacognition, promote habits in professionalism, and create productive groups.

The structure and function of the cell is one of the essential topics in the biology classroom because it is one of the foundations for studying other topics in biology. Monocelly is a digital board game designed to help high school students identify and understand the structure and function of cells and the various organelles within them. This game was developed using Google Sheets to be easy to use and can even be modified by the teacher as needed to help students learn other materials using game-based learning designs.