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The aim of the present paper is to introduce students to tree-thinking through a ludic activity. Phylogenetic trees are the appropriate way to explain biodiversity under the theoretical framework of current evolutionary hypothesis and they should take a central place in public understanding of evolution. Misinterpretation of phylogenies plus the unavailability of didactic material in Spanish for teachers ends up in the reproduction of misunderstandings on the evolutionary theory. The combination of these errors with epistemological problems of evolutionary theories learning generates even more confusion in these subjects. The ludic activity as a learning process provides powerful tools when it comes to acquiring concepts that require abstraction in contents. Educational natural science games, both classical and modern approaches as Game-based learning theory, provide a sense of achievement to players/apprentices and they improve knowledge acquisition. In this context, the activity proposed here invites students to think under the scientific method and it allows them to assimilate abstract concepts by the resolution of evolutionary riddles. This activity gives the concepts to introduce scholars to the study of evolutionary processes, and the diversity of life on Earth under the current educational paradigms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The new ichnospecies Celliforma curvata is described to include curved fossil bee cells from Argentina, Uruguay and the USA. The upper part of the cell (neck) of the new ichnospecies is curved, and accordingly, it can be attributed to bees of the subfamily Diphaglossinae ( Colletidae). The oldest record of C. curvata, from the early Eocene of North America (52-49 Ma), provides a minimum age for the appearance of this subfamily, in accordance with an already proposed calibrated phylogeny. It is also proposed that these fossil cells could be used for future calibrations of molecular clocks. C. curvata indicates that Diphaglossinae had a widespread distribution, from southern Utah to extra- Andean Patagonia at 42° S. In contrast, extant representatives reach only 38° S in this region. Diphaglossinae were more extended southwards in the past thanks to better environmental conditions in extra- Andean Patagonia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]