A Case Study for Teaching Toxicology: Using Whales as an Indicator for Environmental Health

One of the challenges of teaching scientific courses is helping students understand research methods, biological models, and data analysis, which can be especially difficult in classes without a laboratory component. Within the field of toxicology, it is also important for students to understand how living organisms are affected by exposure to toxicants and how these toxicants can impact the ecosystem. Resources focusing on active learning pedagogy are scarce in the field of toxicology compared to other disciplines. In this activity, upper-level students in an introductory toxicology course learn to interpret data from primary literature, draw conclusions about how toxicants, specifically metals, can impact susceptible populations, and understand the One Environmental Health approach. Students work in small groups to answer questions concerning data from a paper and then share their responses with the entire class building their communication skills. The instructor serves as a moderator, allowing the students to work through concepts, intervening only when necessary. This approach enables a deeper level of understanding of content and allows the students to engage actively in the learning process. As such, students think critically through relevant problems and find connections to the real world. This lesson can be adapted for several levels of students and could be modified depending on the objectives of the course.