Amphibians and Reptiles

There is a lot of information available to help students prepare for this event. Karen Lancour, the woman who presented this event at the summer institute and is the head of the biology committee for the national science olympiad, has already posted a variety of resources on the national SO website. There is a very detailed training guide for students, a link to different internet resources, as well as a sample test. In addition to using these resources to prepare, Karen did present a few other tips that can help students to be successful in this event.

1. Make sure the students are familiar with the field guide they bring in to the test. The students are allowed to write in the field guides and use post-it notes as markers. But to be truly successful, they need to have looked through the field guide as many times as possible before the tournament. Karen said that the students who have never looked through their field guides before going in to take the test generally spend all of their time trying to look up specimens for identification, and do not have time to answer any of the questions about habitat, ecology, behavior, etc. Students who are very familiar with their field guide will be able to easily identify specimens, and then can use the field guides to help answer additional questions about the specimens.

2. Have the students look through as many different field guides or resources as possible. Different field guides will have different pictures of each animal. If students have only seen one picture of a certain family or genus of animals, they may have a hard time with identification on the test. Again, the national website has a list of resources that students can use as they prepare for this event.

3. Make sure your students know which of the organisms on the list can be found in your home state. It is very likely that these organisms will appear on the test!