The Never-Ending Story - The Origin and Diversification of Life

Abstract

As outlined in the introductory article "The Neverending Story - Using the Narrative as a Fundamental Approach to Teaching Biology and Beyond," historical storytelling has the potential to add understanding and synthesis to learning that is usually restricted to memorization and skills-based application. The following stories were written in an attempt to reconcile mandated microbiology topics, such as biochemistry and the properties of DNA, with an overarching evolutionary framework that is applicable regardless of the scale of observation. These stories were designed with secondary school biology teachers and students in mind, particularly at the senior-grade level. In an effort to preserve narrative flow, internal referencing has been sacrificed, but a complete set of source material is cited at the end of the compilation.