“Balancing Act” Unit Trailer: Free lessons about tradeoffs in life

Teacher Report | "Balancing Act: Tradeoffs in frogs, humans, and other animals"

You Can't Have It All: Biologists Explain Tradeoffs in Life

Tradeoffs in the Love Language of Frogs

'Balancing Act' |Science| G9-12 (en-US)

Anna Wilkins


Phoebe Will

Kayleen Sugianto

Acknowledgments

#### Connection to Research
 [Dr. Michael Reichert’s lab](https://reichertlab.com/) at Oklahoma State University sponsored this unit. Lesson 1 is not directly related to his work with frogs, but aims to introduce students to many fun examples of tradeoffs in daily life and across the animal kingdom.  In Lesson 1, students work with real research data from [DM Anderson and GF Gilroy (2021)](https://nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/oik.07569) on tradeoffs between mass of offspring and number of offspring, as well as tradeoffs between the number of offspring produced and survival rate. In Lesson 2, students dive into another real data set from [Michael Reichert & Carl Gerhardt (2012)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/230849408_Trade-Offs_and_Upper_Limits_to_Signal_Performance_during_Close-Range_Vocal_Competition_in_Gray_Tree_Frogs_Hyla_versicolor). Students analyze frog calls as researchers do, by observing spectrograms ([pictures of sound](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrogram)) and calculating call rate and frequency. They use their calculations to predict which male frog should be most desirable to females, based on experimental results in the Reichert & Gerhard 2012 paper.  
#### Research Background
 [Dr. Michael Reichert](https://reichertlab.com/) studies how frogs communicate, how metabolism affects their ability to call vigorously, and why some frogs don’t attract mates. Reichert and his graduate students are trying to understand the evolution of behaviors. Specifically, they are interested in how animals use communication strategies to deal with complex environments. For example, how does one male frog stand out from a chorus of other males all trying to attract females? And how do females assess which males are high quality? Lessons 1 and 2 introduce these broader questions and future lessons will dive more into Dr. Reichert’s ongoing research to see whether individual differences in metabolism explain differences in male calling performance.

Background

**[Matt Wilkins](https://storage.googleapis.com/gp-cloud/lessons/BalancingAct_en-US/LinkedIn-or-whatever)** | Led the project, spearheaded all curricular materials, and directed videos  
**[Beth Robelia](https://www.linkedin.com/in/brobelia/)** | Designed and co-developed L1-2 materials; produced videos  
**[Stephanie Castillo](https://www.linkedin.com/in/castils/)** | Produced, edited, narrated, and scored supporting videos  
**[Katie Capp](https://www.linkedin.com/in/katiecapp/)** | Helped develop initial draft materials  
**[Michael Reichert](https://experts.okstate.edu/michael.reichert)** | Defined outreach goals; provided feedback throughout development; provided scientific validation of lesson content  

Credits

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JobViz Career Connections

Tradeoffs in frogs, humans, and other animals

Science

#### Driving Question(s):
- How do trade-offs in how organisms use limited energy and time affect survival and reproduction?
- How do performance thresholds influence mate selection? 
- What insights can we gain about natural selection in Gray Tree Frogs (Hyla versicolor) from the research findings of Dr. Reichert?
#### Hook(s):
Cute frogs, seeing sound in spectrograms, and engaging videos create dynamic lessons.  

Balancing Act

Overhauled lesson 2 materials to address issues raised by Teacher Test Pilots: Tayler Johnson & Alysha Mosco 🙏

Balancing Act

The Gist

Driving Question(s):

Hook(s):

Supporting Multimedia

“Balancing Act” Unit Trailer: Free lessons about tradeoffs in life