Don’t miss the Commentary in Education Week by Paul Horwitz about Evolution Readiness. More than a half-dozen news and Web articles have featured this hot project in the past six months.

A slightly revised version of this article ran in the online version of Education Week on March 1st, 2011. Read the online version in Education Week (subscription required).

Horwitz, director of the Evolution Readiness project, is a commentator for Education Week this week. The National Science Foundation funded the Evolution Readiness project to develop and research computer-based and hands-on curriculum to teach fourth grade students the basic building blocks for understanding the theory of evolution by natural selection.

In the last six months, articles in Education Week, National Science Foundation highlights, LiveScience, and The Hechinger Report have featured this project. And for good reason: it’s showing success teaching young students about the most central concept in biology. Our preliminary research indicates that the Evolution Readiness curriculum helps students understand basic ecology concepts, including precursor knowledge to concepts around adaptation, heritability, and common ancestry. In a time when calls for elementary science are increasing, but younger students are receiving less and less instruction in these important concepts, projects like Evolution Readiness are vital.