ExploreLearning Evolves: New and Enhanced Gizmos

As the school year is winding down, we at EL are gearing up with new Gizmos and enhancements of some of our existing Gizmos. We are very excited about our new Evolution: Mutation and Selection Gizmo, in which you can see a population of bugs adapt to any background color you choose through random mutation and natural selection. Play the Gizmo slowly, and you will see individual mutations appear and slowly accumulate, as some bugs with favorable mutations have a slightly higher chance of survival. Play the Gizmo fast, and you will see how a near perfect match to the background is achieved over a hundred or so generations. It's the perfect tool for teaching a difficult concept.

On the topic of natural selection, we have also updated our popular Natural Selection Gizmo, spreading the moths out over several trees and making the well-camouflaged moths much harder to find. We have been making changes to several other Gizmos and their associated Exploration Guides and Assessment Questions as well, including:

• Disease Spread
• Rabbit Population by Season
• Water Cycle
• Rock Cycle
• Building DNA
• RNA and Protein Synthesis

Enjoy!