RUNNING THE ACTIVITY—PART 1
In the first stage of this Activity, ask everyone to crumple up a piece of (scrap) paper. Pick one person to come up to the front of the room and be the initial member of the population. Members of this population should follow these rules:
Did you ever count bacterial colonies growing in a petri dish? Or track the accumulation of money in your savings account? Or watch as mold spread over an old piece of bread? If so, you have observed population growth in action. As populations grow, the change in the number of individuals in those populations over time can be classified in different ways. Exponential growth and logistic growth are terms applied to specific patterns of population expansion. Both exponential and logistic growth are central to many processes and are the basis for many models.