Introduction to Detecting Cancer

Cancer detection is part of a more general issue in chemistry and all of science—“seeing” the invisible. The idea of direct and indirect evidence and of microscopic and macroscopic properties can be explored here, especially in the Cancer Detectives activity. This class lab activity can be used as the centerpiece for this section. Note that the activity called In Control: Simulated Self Exams appears on the Teacher's Guide site map only. It is a lab that simulates breast and testicular self-exams and should be used only at your discretion.

There are three mathematical activities in this section. The first, See It Now Part 1: Interpreting a Graph, asks students to interpret data presented in graphical form. The second, See It Now Part 2: Interpreting Pie Charts, uses pie charts to supply the information, and the third, See It Now Part 3: Making a Bar Graph, gives students practice in making a bar graph. Note that the data in these activities are related to cancer detection in large populations. These three activities along with Cancer Detectives are part of a set of activities in Magic Bullets related to cancer epidemiology. An additional epidemiology activity elsewhere in the module is Tobacco Trails: Smoking and Geography.

The activities in this section are:

Cancer Detectives: A Class Simulation (C, L)
Cell Growth: Doubling Up (M)
See It Now Part 1: Interpreting a Graph (P, M)
See It Now Part 2: Interpreting Pie Charts (P, M)
See It Now Part 3: Making a Bar Graph (P, M)
Word Search (P)
In Control: Simulated Self-Exams (C)