Learner Guide

Gene Flow Mapper learner guide

Use this guide to frame the app with a clear question, expected observations, and follow-up discussion rather than treating the simulation as a standalone activity.

Open application Teacher guide Standards

Teaching Focus

Learner tasks

Run a no-barrier case and describe the resulting pattern across the landscape.
Add one or more barriers and explain how the map changes over time.
Change dispersal distance and compare the effect to changing barrier placement.

Keep this distinction clear

Distance effects can produce gradual separation without a barrier.
Barriers can produce abrupt separation even when dispersal would otherwise connect the landscape.
A summary graph is not the same thing as a full spatial map, so compare both when needed.

Suggested Sequence

Before the run

Define the landscape, the movement conditions, and what pattern would count as evidence for isolation by distance versus barrier-driven separation.

During the run

Run a no-barrier case first, then add barriers or change dispersal distance one at a time and compare the resulting maps.

After the run

Explain whether the observed structure is better accounted for by distance, fragmentation, or both, and propose a further run to test that claim.

Core Question

How do movement and barriers alter the genetic structure of populations across space?

Evidence Prompts

What to record

Which barriers or distance settings were changed.
How the spatial pattern shifted across the landscape over time.
Where divergence appeared gradually and where it appeared abruptly.

Questions to answer

What in the map supports your interpretation of gene flow or separation?
How would you distinguish barrier effects from ordinary distance effects?
What additional landscape change would test your explanation?

Self-Study Path

Try this on your own

Run a no-barrier case, then add one barrier and then a second. Compare the resulting maps and explain what each barrier changed.

Extend the investigation

Pair this app with EcoSpecies or conservation examples to connect spatial models to real habitats and fragmentation questions.

Scientific Virtues

Habits to practice

Ask what evidence in the run supports the explanation, rather than jumping from pattern to conclusion.
Separate observation from inference by naming what the model shows and what you think it means.
Revise the explanation when a parameter change or repeated run produces conflicting results.

Continue the thread

Use the Scientific Virtues page to connect this investigation to broader habits of evidence, skepticism, and revision.