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 < back to authors list Allan Tobin:
Tobin's sensitivity about the first manuscript extended partly from the passion that led him to write it. He loves seeing students learn. "I enjoy teaching undergraduates, especially freshman," he said. "The kinds of questions a naive student asks are most times more interesting than the questions a more sophisticated student asks." How much does Tobin love teaching? Now, as director of the Brain Research Institute at the University of California Los Angeles, he no longer is obligated to teach but insists on taking on an introductory biology course anyway. The course, Tobin said, gives him a chance to introduce students to basic science concepts. Writing Asking About Life, allowed him to do that for a much larger audience. "Writing for people who are just learning about science takes you back to what the most interesting questions are and the best ways to present them," he said. Tobin picked up his love of teaching from watching one of his professors at Harvard. "He would engage students by telling stories," he said. "It was inspiring to see how the stories of science would engage them. He felt that students needed to become interested in science first -- that they could always learn the technical side later." Part of the reason why Tobin says he wrote Asking About Life, was because he thought he could do better than his professor in engaging students -- that he could tell better stories. "I liked the idea of being a guide to students," he said. "I felt I could help them get excited about the process of science." Tobin said he knew that it was possible to explore sophisticated concepts in a way so that anyone could understand them. He felt the trick was making students understand the scientist's motivations. "Science is about curiosity," he said."Curiosity is what drives people to ask about science." So each chapter in Asking About Life begins with a story about a scientist and how he or she came to make a particular scientific discovery. One story is written from the perspective of Rosalind Franklin, whose research was crucial to the discovery of DNA. The stories, the brainchild of coauthor Jennie Dusheck, help students understand what it was like to do science for the individual doing it. A unique aspect
to the book is its illustrations, said Tobin. "For each part of the
book, Jennie Dusheck and I would meet with our editor and our developmental
editor," he said. "Each time we would brainstorm about the best way
of illustrating a concept -- a goal toward which Dusheck particularly
pushed us all." Both Tobin and Dusheck wanted the illustrations to engage
students. One illustration shows the digestive tract as a "disassembly"
line.
Asking About
Life, won a Textbook Excellence Award from the Text and Academic
Authors Association in 1999. "I was delighted to win the Texty," said
Tobin. "It was most gratifying to get an award from my peers, who understand
how much work it is to write a textbook. It is my favorite award." — reported by Kim Pawlak, 2002 |
