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Discrepant Event Lesson: Humanity's Journey,
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Humanity’s Journey
The Samurai Crab, DISCREPANT EVENT Lesson
Authors: William C. Bruce and Jean K. Bruce
William C. Bruce
Associate Dean and Professor
College of Education and Psychology
Phone: (903) 566-7048
e-mail: wbruce@uttyler.edu
http://www.hometreemedia.org
Fax: (903) 566-7036
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The Samurai Crab, DISCREPANT EVENT
People fishing in the Japan Inland Sea often net crabs. The crabs exhibit curious markings: indentations on the top of their shells. Amazingly, these indentations make the crab shell look similar to a Samurai warrior face.
The Samurai Crab, DISCIPLINE:
History, Anthropology, Life Science.
The Samurai Crab, KEY CONCEPTS:
Natural Selection, Japan, Emperors, Samurai.
The Samurai Crab, PROBLEM STATEMENT:
Why are crabs with "face-like" markings on their shells found only in the Japan Inland Sea? In addition, why do the crabs with faces on their shells have a Samurai-warrior appearance?
The Samurai Crab, PROBABLE SOLUTION:
The emperor of Japan, seven-year-old Antoku, became involved in a long bloody battle (Dan-no-ura) between the Heike and the Genji. Emperor Antoku lost to the Genji, along with his forces, April 24, 1185.
The Heike survivors and most of the royal witnesses threw themselves into the sea. Antokus grandmother (Nii-no-ama) drowned with the emperor in the sea to prevent the Genji from capturing Antoku. Only forty-three people, all women, survived the battle.
The local fisher people caught crabs and other fish for a living. As the account goes, shortly after the emperor Antoku died in the sea, fishers netted crabs as usual. Now, however, the fisher people thought that the crabs looked different. The crabs seemed to have strange faces on their shells.
The survivors of the Heike and the Genji battle convinced the fishers that the faces represented reincarnated spirits of the dead Samurai warriors and the dead child-emperor, Antoku. The local fisher people believed in the divinity of the dead emperor.
Frightened, the fishers threw all the crabs with warrior-like faces back into the sea where the crabs continued breeding. Today, fishers continue throwing crabs back into the sea: every crab that looks like a warrior.
Over the centuries, each successive crab generation included more and more with faces; the faces appeared to look more like Samurai warriors' faces.
The people in the area ate only the crabs without Samurai warrior faces. The rejected Heike crabs evolved through natural selection.
The Samurai Crab, POSSIBLE STUDENT HYPOTHESES:
1. The local people have a method of stamping common crabs with Samurai warrior faces.
2. Radioactive fallout made mutations in these Heike crabs, causing them to look as though they have faces.
3. An earthquake made the faces.
4. A volcanic eruption caused the faces.
5. Strange food caused mutations caused the faces.
6. Supernatural powers made the faces; therefore, the fishers protected the reincarnated Samurai.
The Samurai Crab, FACT SHEET:
1. The Japan Inland Sea lies along Honshus Eastern Coast.
2. The Heike crab, a variation of a crab species found in several other locations in the Pacific Ocean, exists only in the Japan Inland Sea.
3. The face on a crab shell resembles a three-dimensional face.
4. The baby Heike crabs also seem to possess faces on their backs.
5. The Japan Inland Sea floor, littered with empty discarded shells, provides testimony of the Samurai-like face.
6. The Heike crabs shed and grow new shells as they mature. Written records tell of crabs with faces--records at least 700-years old.
7. Fossil proof before 1100 A.D. shows crabs in the Inland Sea lacked face-like images imprinted on their shells.
8. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions have occurred in and around the Inland Sea for millions of years.
9. Pollutants found in the Inland Sea occur in other bodies of water around Japan.
10. A festival, every April 24, celebrates the battle of Dannoura.
11. The Heike crabs taste the same as other crabs in the Inland Sea.
12. The fishers eat and sell crabs without Samurai faces.
13. Fossil proof shows the Heike crabs indentations gradually became more human-like over the past 600 or 700 years.
14. A poem,"Tale of the Heike," describes the defeat and death of Antoku in the Inland Sea.
15. Natural selection caused the three-dimensional faces on the crabs.
16. Other animals have no effect on the Heike crab shells.
17. Falling rocks have no effect on the Heike crab shells, nor do coral with indentations (that look like faces).
18. No equipment in the area could imprint faces on the Heike crabs.
19. In the royal Court under Kiyomori (1118-1181), the Heike (or Taira) Clan ruled. To gain power, the Minamotos Clan (or Genji) opposed the Heike Clan. The strong political power of the Imperial Throne tumbled. Seven centuries of feudal rule began with the Minamoto conquest.
The Samurai Crab, REFERENCES, and RESOURCES:
Arnosky, Jim and Lee Lothrop, 1983, SECRETS OF A WILDLIFE WATCHER, MCM, NY.
Bailey, Jill, 1987, "Discovering Crabs and Lobsters," Discovering Nature Series, Wayland, England, East Sussex, England.
Coronet/MTI Film & Video, 1991, Genetics: Patterns of Diversity, (Video).
Edelson, Edward, 1990, GENETICS AND HEREDITY, the Encyclopedia of Health - The Healthy Body).
Hooker, Richard, 1996, "Warring States of Japan (1467-1573), "World Civilizations.
Humer, Paul J. et al., 1989), PROBING LEVELS OF LIFE: A LABORATORY MANUAL, Merrill Publishing, Columbus, OH.
Instructional Resources Branch, Curriculum and Instruction Division Saskatchewan Education, 1990, "Seeing and Believing," The Scientific Eye, Series II (Video).
Schiff, Bennett, November 1988, "Seven Centuries of Samurai Treasures Come Calling from Daimyo Japan," Smithsonian, Washington, D.C.
Sullivan, Linda, 1978, THE NATURE OF NATURE IN JAPAN, MUSEUMS--EDUCATIONAL ASPECTS--JAPAN, Bank Street College of Education, NY.
Wakan, Naomi and Elias Wakan, 1988, IMAGES OF JAPAN, Pacific-Rim Publishers, (Slides).
The Samurai Crab, LINKS:
Note to readers. Active links to websites about The Samurai Crab are included in the CD books. Each discrepant event module contains about 30 URL links.
The Samurai Crab, GRADE LEVEL:
Secondary, Adult.
Learn more about the Samurai Crab in Cosmos.
Read Jared M. Diamond's book The Third Chimpanzee
Details and Reviews:
Mindtronics! and Inquiry Alive!
* CD-ROM: 680 pages
* Publisher: Home Tree Media (March, 2004)
* ISBN: 097048013x
* Average Amazon Customer Review: 5 Stars, based on 3 reviews.
Amazon Customer Reviews
If you really want to reach your students,
November 15, 2005
Reviewer: J. T. Wilbanks "Tara" (Longview, TX USA)
I am a former student of Dr. Bruce and by accident read Mindtronics! and Inquiry Alive! in preparation and review before my class was to do an in-class model of discrepant event. I thought Dr. Bruce was a little out there until I began to read the book... I realized that this man is not only brilliant - but he is a gifted and wonderful teacher - heart and soul. The ideas that are presented in this book are "out of the box" and they are not the same old boring teaching that all of us have encountered in the public schools. If you want to engage children, challenge them, and get them thinking critically then you will want to read this book and explore for yourself the ideas and models that Dr. Bruce and his wife share in this enlightening and revolutionary book. It is a resource that all school teachers and even parents should have and to use with children. It has the capablility to help an ordinary teacher become an extraordinary teacher.
..an important resource for teachers,
May 16, 2004
Reviewer Michael M Yell
"yellmm" (Hudson, WI United States)
In the mid eighties I first came across the strategy known as discrepant event inquiry in a book by William and Jean Bruce. Discrepant Event Inquiry is a teaching strategy built around intellectual confrontation. From my senior high government and economic classes to my current seventh grade history classes, it is one of the most motivational teaching strategies that I have ever used.
In this strategy, the teacher presents students with a puzzling, paradoxical, or discrepant event/story at the beginning of a lesson. Students ask questions, pose hypotheses, analyze and synthesize information, and draw tentative conclusions while attempting to find an answer to the puzzle. By engaging students in hypothesizing and working together to solve a puzzle, inquiry serves as a strategy for higher order thinking as well as an excellent means of investing student in the content to come. Inquiry is used in order to motivate students to begin thinking about a new unit, idea, or concept that you will be dealing with in your lesson.
Discrepant-event inquiry is a natural for social studies, history and science classes. Mindtronics contains descriptions of the strategy and 100 inquiries in the social sciences, history, and science. As teachers know, the Internet provides a new and unlimited opportunity for gathering information for lessons. Mindtronics contains live links to dozens of Internet sites for each discrepant event inquiry.
With the 100 inquiries, the live links, and the clear description of the strategy, Mindtronics is an excellent and important resource for the social studies and science teacher.
Michael M. Yell
1998 National Social Studies Teacher of the Year
National Board Certified Teacher
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