References: Population Ecology and Life History

1. Population ecology - Wikipedia - Overview of population density, dispersion patterns, and the growth models this chapter develops in detail.

2. Logistic function - Wikipedia - Mathematical treatment of the S-shaped growth curve and the carrying-capacity term that slows growth as a population approaches K.

3. Survivorship curve - Wikipedia - Explains Type I, II, and III mortality patterns and how they relate to life history strategy.

4. Elements of Ecology (9th ed.) - Thomas M. Smith, Robert Leo Smith - Pearson - The Smiths pioneered the paired exponential-and-logistic growth-curve teaching sequence, plotting both models on the same axes so students see carrying capacity as a direct modification of unconstrained growth rather than a separate, unrelated equation.

5. Ecology: The Economy of Nature (8th ed.) - Robert E. Ricklefs, Rick Relyea - W.H. Freeman - Ricklefs originated the "economy of nature" framing itself, using economic analogies of budgets, investment, and trade-offs to teach life-history strategies such as r-selection and K-selection.

6. AP Biology: Ecology - Khan Academy - Free video lessons and practice problems on population growth models and life history strategies aligned to the AP Biology course framework.

7. HHMI BioInteractive - Howard Hughes Medical Institute - Short films and interactive modules on population dynamics, including data-based activities on exponential and logistic growth.

8. Biology 2e - OpenStax - Free college biology textbook chapter on population and community ecology with additional worked growth-rate calculations.

9. Understanding Science - UC Berkeley Museum of Paleontology - Teaching resource on how ecological models are built and tested against real population data.

10. 7.013 Introductory Biology - MIT OpenCourseWare - College-level lecture notes covering population biology and quantitative ecological modeling.