Just finished up the mealworm lab with one class, and will probably scrap it for this year for my other classes. We were not able to get much in the way of useful data. I believe the major problem was the materials - a lot of little things went wrong that I need to correct. First, the cylindrical tubes made of a slippery (for mealworms) plastic caused the mealworms to bunch up together at the entrance, then spin their "wheels" as they tried to walk from one place to another. So each end of the tube, which contained the experimental conditions (such as light/dark, dry/moist, etc.) was just too difficult for the mealworms to get to, much less change their minds and head for the opposite side. They tended to go in whichever direction they were initially oriented in - understandably.
So back to the drawing board in terms of designing the experimental spaces - I will need to go back to a more boxy format with cardboard, which will also make it easier for the students to handle the mealworms. I will post the updated lab sheets when I get that done, meanwhile I've attached a note for teachers warning of the issues.
Addendum
I neglected to mention the insane amount of time I spent finding and modifying the tubes for this activity. Note to self - try on a small scale before investing in a whole class set of custom made materials!!!
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