Using animations to teach biological processes and principles

Well-designed animations can help students to focus on the underlying principles and processes in biology rather than relying on rote memorization.We present question-driven, terminology-free, "candymation" videos for teaching the concepts behind mitosis and meiosis as an example. Biology's memorization problemMost students are initially eager to learn biology, but their enthusiasm often turns to disappointment as they struggle to memorize details whose significance has not been explained.This memorization problem begins in high school but persists through the first years of university [1].For example, students in typical introductory biology courses learn the steps and subcellular locations of photosynthesis reactions, reproduce diagrams of floral reproductive systems and the chambers of the heart, and apply Mendel's Laws to genetic crosses, but often do not realize that the real excitement in biology arises from the challenges these processes evolved to solve and the elegance of the solutions.Textbooks are usually the primary resource, both for students and for instructors who lack the luxury of teaching only their areas of personal expertise, but the role of textbooks as learning guides has been swamped by their role as reference books, burying the broad concepts in a morass of details.In principle, animations can help learning by clarifying events and processes that are not easily observed or described in text and static images [2].Unfortunately, the animations and other resources provided with biology textbooks usually just reinforce the textbooks' emphasis on facts, and the animations available on sites such as YouTube are no better -whether created by students for class assignments or by non-academic educators, they typically just add movement to the textbook illustrations, focusing on the facts students need to remember rather than the processes and principles we want them to understand.Most instructors are eager to shift the emphasis from rote memorization to true learning, both in their own classrooms and by providing resources for others to use.Whereas the work entailed in writing a better textbook puts this endeavor out of reach for almost everyone, creating and distributing animations has literally become child's play, thanks to video hosting sites such as YouTube and inexpensive stop-motion apps.Instructors who want to change what and how their students are learning can now create and share videos that develop curiosity, promote conceptual understanding, and discourage rote memorization.

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