Y7 Biology homework question about egg cells

[emeritusmum]

DS has a multi-choice Doddle quiz for homework about egg cells. I don't know if the questions have been set by his teacher or whether they're a Doddle resource. However, this one confused him (and me). The "correct" answer is selected. However he originally selected the 4th option "Egg cells are made one at a time" because he read the following on BBC Bitesize:

"The two ovaries ... contain hundreds of undeveloped female gametes (sex cells). These are called ova ... or egg cells. Women have these cells in their bodies from birth..."

So they're not made one at a time are they? Surely they're released one at a time, but not made one at a time.

He was also a bit confused about the third option, because he knows cells are small ... we discussed it and decided that it would have been better worded as "large in size compared to other cells".

Am I being unreasonable to think it's a bit shoddy?

My school uses doddle and yes some of the practice quizzes contain ambiguous answers. The egg cells are not made one at a time, they mature one at a time.

Worded by an imbecile

The egg cells cannot be embryos as they are not yet fertilised. Sorry pressed send too soon

Yanbu.

It actually worries me as a biology teacher! You are quite correct op.

Does anyone know if it's written by Doddle or by the teacher? If I'm going to approach him about it, it would be helpful to know.

Technically females aren't born with eggs.

The process is called oogenesis (literally egg making) and goes

Germ cell > primordial germ cell > oogonia > primary oocyte > secondary oocyte > ovum

So the selected answer is correct.

Maybe a life advanced for Y7 but maybe it's to encourage a bit of further reading?

A little*

There's also potential for confusion because what sort of egg cells are they talking about - fertilised or unfertilised?

In the last option, I can see that maybe they're trying to get at egg cells dividing in two each time so they double up each time and rapidly grow so that if you plot them on a graph it grows rapidly rather than +1 each time (and I know I'm wording that badly!) so that obviously they are giving you a wrong answer rather than a right one, but again it's badly worded - as if you have a fertilised egg that's growing, at some point it becomes the embryo (or indeed a chick in an egg shell) when the doubling up stops and it goes about growing as required.

But yes, a really badly worded question overall and definitely worth raising with the teacher!

@emeritusmum doddle is a system the school pays for, the teacher doesn't write the questions, they are made by doddle. The teacher chooses what test to set as homework based on the topic.

An ostrich egg is a single cell, so I wouldn't say all egg cells are 'small' (although in comparison to what? Celestial bodies? Humans? Subatomic particles?). Stupid answer...

An ostrich egg is a single cell, so I wouldn't say all egg cells are 'small' (although in comparison to what? Celestial bodies? Humans? Subatomic particles?). Stupid answer...

They are the largest cell in the human body though

Off topic

It actually worries me as a biology teacher! You are quite correct op.

I teach level 3 health and social care, it is frightening how many students think deoxygenated blood is blue and that if you cut yourself the blood making contact with the air is 'oxygenation' so they bleed red.