Scientists with pencils: Drawing as a tool for observation

When mentoring young scientists, a key goal is teaching the benefits of patient and focused observation. This is an all the more useful skill as a general practice, since thanks to ubiquitous hand-held devices, students are likely experiencing the world as smaller and smaller chunks of experience on shorter and shorter timescales. Here we describe a popular lab in our Principles of Ecology course targeted at university juniors and seniors. It seeks to foster the quiet concentration of a focused natural historian, using a pencil, a sheet of paper, a mammal skull from the Natural History Museum, and gentle coaching.