iEvo is a theory, was an experiment, and may be considered as an educational effect.
iEvo is a fictitious scientific theory. It was created by a professor to provide students with personal experience in learning how to use the Internet to learn. Ironically, as iEvo was perpetrated using the Internet, itself, students used the Internet to learn to use the Internet to learn! And, as the material that was made available via the Internet about iEvo involved a fictitious study in which researchers purportedly used the Internet to acquire data about how students use the Internet … well, you get the idea.
iEvo was an experiment conducted with, or, more accurately, on students in an evolutionary biology course to address gaps in scientific learning. The gaps since have been described effectively as three missing goals among four identified by the United States National Academies as essential to science education (1). College and university curricula are designed primarily to prepare students to use, interpret, and, especially, know scientific explanations about the natural world (the one realized goal). They generally fail to prepare students to
iEvo and the results that it produced represent an effect in contemporary education: students should beware what they access on the Internet. This cautionary rule is familiar to anyone who surfs the Internet for information, even casually, as a recreational activity. But, in educational pursuits, with the emphasis on knowledge inherent in postsecondary education curricula, even experienced surfers can become lulled or lured into accessing dubious content. Students must learn how to learn to use the Internet, and iEvo was created for students to teach themselves how to evaluate, understand, and participate in electronically based scientific research.
The theory, experiment, and effect are documented and described in an essay . The essay is intended to provide students who read it with appreciation for what their peers in the course experienced and benefit as they did, to learn to use the Internet effectively as a learning tool.