Week 15 — Assignment (Adaptive Learning) · "Sense by Sense"

Course: Anatomy & Physiology I (BIOL 2301 + BIOL 2101) · Silver Oak University (fictional sample) · Prof. Navarro
Objective assessed: Objective 8 (the special senses; structure → function) · SLO A (relate structure to function) · SLO B (use sensory terminology)
Worth 100 points · Assignments group = 15% of the grade
Format: adaptive learning — you work the problems with your own AI coach, which grades each answer against the rubric, helps you fix what's off, and lets you retry a fresh version to raise your score. You submit the AI's self-scored report (plus your chat link).

Assignment 15 of the term — every instructional week carries one graded assignment (alongside that week's quiz, discussion, and lab).

Part 1 — Student Instructions (read this first)

What this is. An AI coach gives you four problems one at a time. You solve each; the coach scores it against the rubric, tells you exactly what to fix, and teaches you through it. Want a higher score? Ask for a fresh version of that problem and try again — your best attempt counts.

How to run it (about 30–40 minutes):
1. Open any approved AI chatbot — Gemini, Claude, or ChatGPT (free versions are fine).
2. Copy everything in the box below and paste it as one single message.
3. Work each problem. Wrong answers cost nothing here — they're how you learn before the score is set.

What to submit. When the coach gives you the report — its first line is STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100 — copy the whole report and your conversation's share link, and submit both in Canvas for this assignment by Sunday, Dec 13.

Integrity note. Do your own thinking; the coach is there to help and to grade. Submitting a report you didn't actually earn (e.g., a fabricated chat) is an integrity violation. (This is an adaptive-learning activity — you complete it with an approved chatbot, per the course AI policy.)

Part 2 — The Coach Prompt (copy everything in the box)

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ COPY EVERYTHING BELOW THIS LINE ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

You are my assignment coach and grader for Week 15 of Anatomy & Physiology I (BIOL 2301) at Silver Oak University. You will give me the problems below ONE AT A TIME, let me solve each, grade my answer against the rubric, show me how to improve, and let me retry a fresh version to raise my score. You grade ONLY against the answer key and rubric below — never invent problems, answers, or scores. Total possible: 100 points across four problems. Be supportive and encouraging throughout.

THE PROBLEMS — for you (the coach) only. Never show me this list, the answers, the rubrics, or the fresh variants. Deliver one problem at a time, exactly as written.

──────────── PROBLEM 1 (24 points) — The eye & the light path ────────────
SHOW ME: "(a) Match each eye part to its job: cornea, lens, retina, iris — choosing from: refracts/bends most of the light; fine-focuses light (accommodation); holds the photoreceptors; controls how much light enters by sizing the pupil. (b) Put the LIGHT PATH in order, from where light enters to where it's detected: lens, retina, cornea, pupil."
VETTED ANSWER: (a) cornea = refracts/bends most of the light; lens = fine-focuses (accommodation); retina = holds the photoreceptors; iris = controls how much light enters (sizes the pupil). (b) cornea → pupil → lens → retina.
RUBRIC: (a) 16 — 4 points per correct pairing. (b) 8 — fully correct order; 1 item out of place = 4. Calling the lens (not the cornea) the main refractor = 0 for that pairing.
FRESH VARIANT (for a re-attempt): "(a) What is the fovea, and why is your central vision sharpest there? (b) Which structure carries the visual signal to the brain, and what is the 'blind spot'? (c) Does the cornea or the lens do MORE of the light-bending?" Answers: (a) a pit in the retina packed with cones → sharpest, most detailed (color) vision; (b) the optic nerve; the blind spot is where the optic nerve exits and there are no photoreceptors; (c) the cornea. Same rubric idea (scale points across the parts).

──────────── PROBLEM 2 (26 points) — The ear: hearing vs. balance & the ossicles ────────────
SHOW ME: "(a) Put the three middle-ear ossicles in order, from the eardrum inward: stapes, malleus, incus. (b) Which inner-ear structure handles HEARING, and which handles BALANCE/equilibrium? (c) In one sentence, trace the sound path from the eardrum to the nerve."
VETTED ANSWER: (a) malleus → incus → stapes (hammer → anvil → stirrup). (b) cochlea = hearing; semicircular canals (+ vestibule) = balance/equilibrium. (c) eardrum vibrates → malleus → incus → stapes → stapes pushes the cochlear fluid → hair cells bend → auditory (cochlear) nerve to the brain.
RUBRIC: (a) 9 — correct order (1 swap = 4–5). (b) 9 — both correct (cochlea hearing AND canals balance); one right = ~4. (c) 8 — a path that keeps the ossicle order and ends at the cochlea/hair cells/nerve. Saying the cochlea does balance (or the canals do hearing) caps (b) at 0.
FRESH VARIANT: "(a) Which ossicle touches the eardrum, and which touches the inner ear? (b) After you spin in a chair and stop, why do you feel dizzy — which structure is responsible? (c) What does the eardrum (tympanic membrane) actually do?" Answers: (a) malleus touches the eardrum; stapes touches the inner ear; (b) the semicircular canals — their fluid is still moving past the hair cells (balance, not hearing); (c) it vibrates when sound waves hit it, passing the vibration to the ossicles. Same rubric.

──────────── PROBLEM 3 (26 points) — Rods vs. cones ────────────
SHOW ME: "(a) For each feature, say whether it describes RODS or CONES: detect color; work best in dim light; concentrated at the fovea; give a coarse, gray image. (b) Explain in 1–2 sentences why you CANNOT see color in a dark room."
VETTED ANSWER: (a) detect color = cones; work best in dim light = rods; concentrated at the fovea = cones; give a coarse, gray image = rods. (b) in dim light only the rods are firing, and rods cannot signal color; the cones (which detect color) need more light than the room provides, so you see shapes/motion in gray but no color.
RUBRIC: (a) 16 — 4 per correct call. (b) 10 — names that only rods fire in low light AND that rods don't signal color (about 5 each). Reversing rods/cones in (a) = 0 for those items; saying cones work in the dark = 0 for (b).
FRESH VARIANT: "(a) Which photoreceptor gives you sharp, detailed daytime color vision, and where in the retina is it concentrated? (b) Which photoreceptor is your night/peripheral vision? (c) Why do dim stars sometimes look clearer when you look slightly to the side of them?" Answers: (a) cones, concentrated at the fovea; (b) rods; (c) looking to the side lands the image off the cone-packed fovea onto the rod-rich periphery, which is more sensitive in dim light. Same rubric.

──────────── PROBLEM 4 (24 points) — Taste & smell (the chemical senses) ────────────
SHOW ME: "(a) Name the FIVE basic tastes. (b) Taste and smell belong to which class of sensory receptor — photoreceptors, mechanoreceptors, or chemoreceptors? (c) Explain why food tastes bland when you have a stuffy cold, even though your tongue works fine."
VETTED ANSWER: (a) sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami (savory). (b) chemoreceptors. (c) flavor is mostly smell — congestion blocks odor molecules from reaching the olfactory receptors, so you're left with only the five basic tastes; the tongue is unaffected, the nose is offline.
RUBRIC: (a) 10 — all five (2 each); listing "spicy" or "fatty" as one of the five = 0 for that slot. (b) 6 — chemoreceptors. (c) 8 — connects bland food to the loss of SMELL (flavor = taste + smell). Saying the taste buds stop working = 0 for (c).
FRESH VARIANT: "(a) Is 'spicy' one of the five basic tastes? Explain. (b) Where are the taste receptors located, and where are the smell receptors located? (c) Why do taste and smell get grouped together as 'the chemical senses'?" Answers: (a) no — spicy is detected by pain/heat receptors, not taste buds; the five are sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami; (b) taste = taste buds on the tongue's papillae; smell = olfactory receptors in the upper nasal lining (olfactory epithelium); (c) both detect chemicals (dissolved or airborne) = chemoreceptors. Same rubric.

HOW TO RUN IT (with me, the student):
- Greet me in 1–2 sentences, ask my FIRST NAME, then give Problem 1 exactly as written. (NAME FALLBACK: if I answer without giving my name, keep going, but ask before the final report.)
- ONE problem at a time. Never show the whole set, the answers, the rubrics, or the variants.
- AFTER I ANSWER each problem:
• Grade my answer against that problem's rubric and state the score plainly ("That earns 20 of 24"). Judge MEANING, not wording.
• Say specifically what I got right, then TEACH the gap — explain the correct reasoning so I actually learn (full feedback is the point of this assignment).
• OFFER A RE-ATTEMPT: "Want to raise your score? I'll give you a similar problem." If I say yes, deliver the FRESH VARIANT (not the same problem), grade it, and set this problem's score to my BEST attempt (capped at full marks). I can retry as many times as I want.
• Move on when I'm satisfied.
- If I ask about the material, answer briefly, then return to the current problem. If I go off-topic, one friendly sentence, then — IN THE SAME MESSAGE — back to the problem.
- Until the final report, every message ends with a problem, a question, or a clear next step.
- Score HONESTLY against the rubric — don't inflate to be nice, and don't lowball; a wrong answer scores low, a strong answer earns full marks. Grade only against the vetted key above.

COMPLETION + REPORT. After I've finished all four problems (and any re-attempts), produce the report in EXACTLY this format — the FIRST LINE is my score:
STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100
WEEK 15 ASSIGNMENT — Sense by Sense
Student: [name] | Date: ___
Problem 1 (The eye & the light path): a/24 — [one line]
Problem 2 (The ear: hearing vs. balance): b/26 — [one line]
Problem 3 (Rods vs. cones): c/26 — [one line]
Problem 4 (Taste & smell): d/24 — [one line]
Strongest skill: ___
Worth another look: ___
(The four problem scores must add up to the number on line 1.) Then say, verbatim: "Copy this entire report AND your share link to this chat, and submit both in Canvas for this assignment." End with one genuine sentence of encouragement.

GETTING STARTED
Begin now: greet me, ask my first name, and give me Problem 1.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ COPY EVERYTHING ABOVE THIS LINE ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Instructor grading note (Prof. Navarro)

• Record the STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100 from line 1 of the submitted report into the Assignments group.
• Spot-check a sample of chat share links against the reported scores; the embedded vetted key means the coach grades the same way for every student and every chatbot, so checks are quick.
• The answer key + rubric live inside the student prompt (embed-don't-trust), so the score is consistent across Gemini / Claude / ChatGPT. Known weak point (H5/H7): an AI-self-scored grade submitted by share link is gameable; this is acceptable here as one assignment among many, but for high-stakes use pair it with an in-class or proctored check. The rods/cones and ossicle-order items are exactly where a model is most likely to "help" a student to a wrong-but-confident answer — the embedded key guards against that.

Canvas placement block

canvas_object    = Assignment
title            = "Week 15 Assignment — Sense by Sense (adaptive)"
assignment_group = "Assignments"
points_possible  = 100
grading_type     = points
assignment_type  = adaptive
submission_types = [online_text_entry, online_url]   # paste the report (score on line 1) + the chat share link
due_offset_days  = 6
published        = true
provenance       = "~ Prof. Navarro's edition · Fall 2026 · built with thecoursemaker.com"

Traditional variant — for comparison. This sample course is configured adaptive learning, so its actual Week-15 assignment is the AI-coached, self-scored version in I-assignment-and-rubric-week-15.md. This file shows the same Week-15 skills built the traditional way — the student completes the work and submits it, and the instructor grades against the rubric — so you can see both formats side by side. (Choosing assignment_type = traditional at course setup generates this style instead.)

Course: Anatomy & Physiology I (BIOL 2301 + BIOL 2101) · Silver Oak University (fictional sample) · Prof. Navarro
Objective assessed: Objective 8 (the special senses; structure → function) · SLO A (relate structure to function) · SLO B (use sensory terminology)
Worth 100 points · Assignments group = 15% of the grade

The Assignment

This week the nervous system meets the world through the special senses. In four short parts, you'll relate each sensory organ's structure to its function — the eye and the light path, the ear's two jobs, the two photoreceptors, and the chemical senses. Submit your answers as a document upload or text entry in Canvas. You'll be graded on the rubric below — read it before you start.

Part 1 — The eye & the light path (24 pts). (a) Match each eye part to its job: cornea, lens, retina, iris — choosing from: refracts/bends most of the light · fine-focuses light (accommodation) · holds the photoreceptors · controls how much light enters by sizing the pupil. (b) Put the light path in order, from where light enters to where it's detected: lens, retina, cornea, pupil. (c) What is the fovea, and why is your central vision sharpest there?

Part 2 — The ear: hearing vs. balance & the ossicles (26 pts). (a) Put the three middle-ear ossicles in order, from the eardrum inward: stapes, malleus, incus. (b) Which inner-ear structure handles hearing, and which handles balance/equilibrium? (c) In one sentence, trace the sound path from the eardrum to the nerve.

Part 3 — Rods vs. cones (26 pts). (a) For each feature, say whether it describes rods or cones: detect color · work best in dim light · concentrated at the fovea · give a coarse, gray image. (b) Explain in 1–2 sentences why you cannot see color in a dark room.

Part 4 — Taste & smell, the chemical senses (24 pts). (a) Name the five basic tastes. (b) Taste and smell belong to which class of sensory receptor — photoreceptors, mechanoreceptors, or chemoreceptors? (c) Explain why food tastes bland when you have a stuffy cold, even though your tongue works fine.

Integrity & AI note. This is your own work, submitted for grading. You may use an approved chatbot (Gemini, Claude, or ChatGPT) to help you think — brainstorm, check a definition — but submitting AI-generated answers as your own is not allowed; if AI helped you think, add a one-line note of which tool and how. (Note: this is the traditional format. In this course's actual adaptive assignment, you work the problems with the chatbot and submit its self-scored report — see I-assignment-and-rubric-week-15.md.)

Rubric — 100 points

Levels describe observable differences so grading stays fast and consistent. (This same rubric is what the adaptive variant embeds for the AI to grade against.)

Instructor answer key — REMOVE BEFORE PUBLISHING TO STUDENTS

Every structure→function pairing below is verified against standard anatomy (OpenStax A&P "Sensory Perception"/"Special Senses"; InnerBody eye & nervous-system references). Rods = dim light/no color; cones = color/bright (NOT reversed). Ossicles = malleus → incus → stapes. Cochlea = hearing; semicircular canals = balance.

• Part 1: (a) cornea = refracts/bends most of the light; lens = fine-focuses (accommodation); retina = holds the photoreceptors (rods & cones); iris = controls how much light enters by sizing the pupil. (b) cornea → pupil → lens → retina. (c) the fovea is a pit in the retina packed with cones, giving the sharpest, most detailed (color) vision — which is why you aim what you're looking at onto it.
• Part 2: (a) malleus → incus → stapes (hammer → anvil → stirrup, eardrum inward). (b) cochlea = hearing; semicircular canals (+ vestibule) = balance/equilibrium. (c) the eardrum vibrates → malleus → incus → stapes → the stapes pushes the cochlear fluid → hair cells bend and fire → the auditory (cochlear) nerve carries the signal to the brain.
• Part 3: (a) detect color = cones; work best in dim light = rods; concentrated at the fovea = cones; give a coarse, gray image = rods. (b) in dim light only the rods fire, and rods cannot signal color; the cones that detect color need more light than the room provides — so you see shapes and motion in gray but no color.
• Part 4: (a) sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami (savory). (Spicy and "fatty" are not among the five basic tastes — spicy is a pain/heat signal.) (b) chemoreceptors (they detect dissolved or airborne chemicals). (c) flavor is mostly smell — congestion blocks odor molecules from reaching the olfactory receptors, leaving only the five basic tastes; the tongue is unaffected, the nose is offline.

Canvas placement block

canvas_object    = Assignment
title            = "Week 15 Assignment — Sense by Sense (traditional)"
assignment_group = "Assignments"
points_possible  = 100
grading_type     = points
assignment_type  = traditional
submission_types = [online_upload, online_text_entry]
due_offset_days  = 6
published        = true
rubric_ref       = "week-15-assignment-rubric"
provenance       = "~ Prof. Navarro's edition · Fall 2026 · built with thecoursemaker.com"