Science class at Culver explores how man’s best friend evolved from wolves

Culver Academies has a new science class that seeks to take a more interesting approach to linking core concepts of molecular biology, genetics and evolution by examining how dogs evolved from wolves while teaching the scientific process.

“Students take biology classes that teach them these subjects, but how does this relate to the real world? Why do I care? Then they realize, ‘Oh, my dog is a result of these things,’ ” said senior science instructor Chris Gamel, Ph.D. “I just find it's much easier for students to get excited about dogs and wolves than the bacteria they’re looking at through a microscope.”

The semester-long class, “Advanced Biology with Research,” includes a daylong trip to Wolf Park in Battle Ground, Indiana, so students can observe wolves. That included staying for the evening “wolf howl.”

“Most people have experience with dogs. They've heard that dogs evolved from wolves. But it's kind of like, ‘Well how? How did that happen?’ Let's understand the science behind it,” Gamel said.

Gamel said Culver’s Dean of Studies Jackie Carrillo, Ph.D., approached him about 18 months ago with the idea of coming up with an alternative to Advanced Placement Biology, a class Gamel has taught for seven years.

Gamel said the problem with AP Biology is there is no freedom to spend more time on areas Culver believes are more important. He must stick to a strict schedule to ensure he covers everything on the AP Biology test.

He estimates there is about 60 percent overlap between the new class and AP Biology. However, each class explores these topics in unique ways and students who enroll in both classes apply their learning to disparate situations.

Gamel said this new class lets him set priorities for which topics to focus on so students learn the competencies Culver believes are most important.

“If there’s something we didn’t get to, that’s fine. I’m the only one disappointed in that,” he said.

Gamel describes himself as an animal behaviorist.

“I’m a vertebrate biologist. I study large animals. The more easily an animal can eat me, the more interesting I tend to find it,” he said.

When he started planning the class, there were four questions he wanted students to tackle:

1.      What is behavior and how is it impacted/controlled by an organism’s shape?

2.     What determines the shape of an individual organism throughout its lifespan?

3.     How is an organism’s shape passed from one generation to the next?

4.    How can an organism’s shape change over time?

 

 

Students read “‘How to Tame a Fox,” by Dmitri Belyaev and Lyudmila Trut.

“If you are studying wolves and dogs, of course you read about foxes,” Gamel joked.

The Russian biologists studied how dogs became domesticated by trying to re-create the process of domestication with foxes. Beginning in 1959, working at a farm where foxes were bred to make fur coats, they bred the tamest foxes.

Dog traits started showing up in foxes. Their tails, which were straight, began getting curved and the foxes began wagging their tails. Their ears went from being upright to floppy.

“Why? What was going on? So it's great book,” Gamel said.

Students read a chapter a week and Gamel then holds Harkness discussions on Fridays. A Harkness discussion is a student-centered discussion method where students work together to explore ideas and learn from each other.

Gamel also draws on the book “How Dogs Work” by Raymond Coppinger and Mark Feinstein to explain the importance of size when it comes to sled dogs.

“The perfect sled dog is 50 pounds. Not bigger, not smaller,” Gamel said. “So in class we talk about: Why would a 50-pound dog be the perfect size?”

He said smaller dogs aren’t powerful enough to pull a sled and larger dogs would require more food, making it more difficult to pull the sled, and they conserve heat better and become overheated.

“A 50-pound dog can work at maximum capacity and still stay cool enough to keep working,” he said. “A bigger dog is a little stronger but can’t go as long. So there is a perfect shape to be a sled dog.”

At the Wolf Park, students saw the wolves enjoying handlers rubbing their bellies and the wolves jumping up and playing like dogs.

But Gamel said the only way the trainers got the wolves to behave like that was the wolves were exposed to human attention for 24 hours a day, seven days a week for the first six months of their lives.

“That's what they need to do to socialize the wolf,” he said. “Do you know what it takes to socialize a dog? You need to spend a couple of hours a week between the time they are between five weeks and seven weeks old. That's it.”

 

 

He said the class looks at other ways the animals are alike and different. Gamel said there are vast differences. In wolves, a family unit takes care of the pups. For dogs, the mother is left alone to care for the pup. A mother dog will nurse a puppy, but doesn’t otherwise feed a puppy. Wolves will regurgitate food and give it to the pups. Dogs almost never do that.

“But dogs also generally live in a world where a person is putting a meal bowl in front of them,” he said.  

Each student must create a research proposal as though they work for a large museum. They have to develop questions and support conclusions.

“Developing questions as a scientist is all about not just what questions do I ask, but how do I get answers to those questions,” Gamel said. “By having them develop a research project they’re going to have to do a deep dive into their area. What is already known and what isn’t? How do I design an experiment to actually test this?”

Senior Catherine Mahoney said she likes how the class connects scientific ideas to real-life examples, citing the trip to Wolf Park.

“You can just really tell that he cares about what he teaches and he put a lot of love into making this class,” Mahoney said.

Gabri West ’26 said she took the class because she has a strong interest in dogs. She has two dogs and her mother owns a pet boutique. She said she found the class interesting, particularly the behavioral studies. That was her favorite part.

“It was one of the best science classes I’ve ever taken. I’ve told a lot of people that science as a career was the one thing I had ruled out of things I might become. Then I took this class and I think, ‘Well I could just be a biologist and study animal behavior,’ ” she said.