Big Idea 16: Heredity and Reproduction

Students will discover how paleontologists study and classify dinosaurs and how evolutionary biologists study the relationships between organisms. Students will use fossil and genetic evidence to investigate evolutionary relationships between living and extinct organisms.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson can be integrated with math concepts/practices comparing probability.  The science and engineering concepts/practices are to determine the probability for genotype and phenotype combinations using Punnett Squares and Pedigrees.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will explore principles of heredity through an activity where they design a themed Potato Head toy set.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson explores the importance of Punnett squares in determining genetic characteristics. It uses a 3D printer to demonstrate these characteristics.

Type: Lesson Plan

The owner of newly opened Smith Valley Farms is looking to breed the next generation of top race horses. In this MEA, students will study race horse pedigrees as well as horse racing data to determine which is the best stallion to breed with a filly. Students will have to read a horse pedigree, calculate percentages based on a data table, and complete Punnett squares to determine genetic probability.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will learn about the stages of mitosis in cell reproduction and will study an application of mitosis for healing the human body.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a lesson that uses Socratic seminars and student-generated arguments to explore the uses of biotechnology and their potential impact on society.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson uses pooches to teach about pedigrees and the impact of artificial selection on individuals and populations as well as to drive home math concepts already discussed in lessons on Punnet squares.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will participate in determining traits of a monster by throwing a die. Students will develop an understanding of how genetics play a role in determining the phenotype of an individual.

Type: Lesson Plan

This two-day lesson reviews the differences between mitosis and meiosis and how each is used for the processes of sexual and asexual reproduction. The lesson then focuses on the advantages and disadvantages of each type of reproduction.

Type: Lesson Plan

After students have an understanding of Punnett squares and their purpose, students will then be introduced to pedigrees. Students will be shown the purpose of pedigrees, how to read them, and how to create one. 

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson was designed to help students understand the differences between sexual and asexual reproduction. It includes multi-media resources and hands-on activities that reveal the benefits and limitations of both. The student will ultimately determine the likelihood of a genotype resulting in a specific phenotype.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will use Punnett squares to calculate the probabilities of different genotypes and phenotypes produced by genetic crosses.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson is designed to teach students how to read and interpret Punnett square with the final goal of them creating their own squares. The students will be able to determine possible genotypes and phenotypes of offspring based parent alleles.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is an introductory lesson for middle school genetics with a focus on vocabulary development and conceptual understanding.

Type: Lesson Plan

The nucleus of the cell contains genetic material known as DNA. Sections of DNA are genes that code for specific traits and DNA coils to create chromosomes. Students will be able to define DNA, chromosomes, and genes. Students will also create a model to show how these structures are related and where they are found in the cell.

Type: Lesson Plan

Is it meiosis or mitosis? How does meiosis compare to mitosis? There is no life without cell division. Explore the differences and similarities between these processes to understand how they affect your life!

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will use reading strategies to help them understand how the DNA replication process works.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will learn how to draw, complete, interpret, calculate the probabilities, and figure ratios for single trait crosses with complete dominance interaction.

Type: Lesson Plan

The words "create a baby" will grab the attention of any student. After studying the probabilities for genotype and phenotype using Punnett squares, this is an activity that will unify all previous tasks. The activity asks students to illustrate a baby using prior knowledge of vocabulary such as allele, trait, phenotype, genotype, dominant, and recessive.
The goal of this lesson is to take the pieces and parts of the "genetic language" that has been taught using Punnett Squares and pull everything together to show that "genetic material from mom and dad make me." The creation of a baby from single inheritance traits will reinforce why we study probability of what offspring will look like, what an allele is, and what the difference between phenotype and genotype are.
Note that incomplete dominance and polygenic traits are represented by single gene traits only for the purposes of this lesson.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will examine Gregor Mendel's laws of genetics in this lesson. Students will first explore the range of variation in human physical traits and discuss where this variation comes from. They will be then paired into groups and given the role of genetic counselors that are trying to predict the traits of offspring using traits of their parents. A toss of a coin will represent alleles for various characteristics. Students will combine dominant and recessive traits to determine the phenotype and genotype of their genetic babies. Their predicted baby will be displayed for peers to view. As an extension to this activity, the students can learn that through gene technology, parents may soon have more choices available to them: hair color, physical size, intelligence. Students canl research and evaluate how can science answer new and ethical questions.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will read "Your Genes, Your Choices." They will explore the impact of Biotechnology and create a brochure that represents what they have learned. By the end of the lesson, students will have a better understanding of DNA, GMOs, and Biotechnology.

Type: Lesson Plan

"A Taste of DNA" is an activity-based lesson intended to be used as a reinforcement of the concepts associated with the structure of DNA and building DNA. It covers information pertaining to base pairing, DNA shape and structure, cellular organelles, and the function of DNA. In this lesson students will have the opportunity to move around the classroom, build a long strand across the science floor, and create their own strand with the knowledge they've gained.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students work collaboratively to explore genetics with SpongeBob and the Bikini Bottoms gang! The learners will take pre/post quizzes, watch a short video clip, complete a worksheet cooperatively within small groups, and rate their understanding using the learning scale included with the lesson. The activities within this lesson is best implemented towards the end of a unit on heredity and genetics.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will be doing numerous engaging activities in order to successfully address and target the standard of comparing/contrasting the general processes of mitosis and meiosis. The activities are designed to introduce mitosis and meiosis in an engaging way. Food and hands-on activities are a motivator in this lesson plan, which includes modeling and differentiating mitosis and meiosis.

Type: Lesson Plan

The lesson provides a hands-on activity for students to distinguish between genotype and phenotype.

Type: Lesson Plan

ResourceID: 75789

The lesson will begin with the teacher engaging the students with a short assessment of prior knowledge using a pre-lesson Q&A with short discussion throughout. Next the teacher will show an animated video clip about Meiosis and an animated video clip about Mitosis http://vcell.ndsu.nodak.edu/animations/mitosis/movie-flash.htm. The teacher will then discuss the differences between Mitosis and Meiosis with the help of a projected or drawn graphic organizer. Next, the teacher will show examples of stop-motion videos made that depict the phases of mitosis and meiosis. The teacher will also show how to make a storyboard that will be required before students can begin making their videos. A rubric will be used and feedback given to make sure that the storyboard is complete before progressing. The students will use digital cameras (ipads, ipods, flip cameras, built-in computer cams, phone cams, etc to take images of the sequential movements of the models representing the process of cell reproduction (meiosis and/or mitosis). Students will present their finished videos to the class and comparing and contrasting meiosis and mitosis will be done throughout and as a whole group afterwards. The videos will be evaluated by the students themselves and by the teacher using a rubric.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson primarily addresses students discovering the concept of dominant and recessive alleles by examining how genotype determines phenotype through a structured inquiry. Punnett squares are also introduced as an extension of the primary activity.

Type: Lesson Plan

During this lesson, students will use Punnett Squares to determine the probability of an offspring's characteristics.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will learn about aspects of biotechnology and apply their understanding to a debate about using genetic engineering to engineer better athletes.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson, which follows the Argument Driven Inquiry model of instruction, asks students to use a Pedigree and Punnett Squares to explain Grandma's mysterious plants. Given physical traits in a small population of plants, students determine which gene is dominant and if a specific group of plants is homozygous or heterozygous.

Type: Lesson Plan

A computer simulation package called "Star Genetics" is used to generate progeny for one or two additional generations. The distribution of the phenotypes of the progeny provide data from which the parental genotypes can be inferred. The number of progeny can be chosen by the student in order to increase the student's confidence in the inference.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students explore morphology (body shape) of fish and how they can indicate the fish"s lifestyle.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will learn how to take a clipping from a mother tomato plant and make an exact duplicate copy for mass-reproduction that will produce a harvest quickly. This will engage students as they discover this can be done without seeds, and they can grow a plant about 2 feet in height!

Type: Lesson Plan

In this Model-Eliciting Activity (MEA), students must help geneticists develop a new breed of scientific explorer. Using knowledge of genetics, genotypes, and phenotypes, students must select a combination of alleles that could create people better adapted for exploring dangerous areas and other worlds. Then, students must choose which genetic alterations to apply to themselves!

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. MEAs resemble engineering problems and encourage students to create solutions in the form of mathematical and scientific models. Students work in teams to apply their knowledge of science and mathematics to solve an open-ended problem while considering constraints and tradeoffs. Students integrate their ELA skills into MEAs as they are asked to clearly document their thought processes. MEAs follow a problem-based, student-centered approach to learning, where students are encouraged to grapple with the problem while the teacher acts as a facilitator. To learn more about MEAs visit: https://www.cpalms.org/cpalms/mea.aspx

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson students will investigate pedigrees and culminate in an activity where students create their own or imaginary pedigree.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a lesson on genes, alleles and chromosomes. This lesson will teach dominant and recessive genes.

Type: Lesson Plan

Beginning genetics lesson for 7th grade students.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students simulate the process of meiosis for an alien society. The students choose physical characteristics for hair, nose and eyes corresponding to genes and then generate two alien babies. Then pictures of the parents and babies are drawn, with similarities and differences noted and explained.

Type: Lesson Plan

Lesson to help students understand how to predict genotype and phenotype probabilities using Punnet Squares and pedigrees.

Type: Lesson Plan

Through this lesson, students will use pedigree analysis in the context of mitochondrial DNA inheritance to determine how they would identify a missing person.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will discover how DNA will "code" for traits by performing a lab activity where segments of paper DNA (genes) are picked at random, a list of traits is made, and a dog is drawn featuring its genetic traits.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a hands-on activity that will help students distinguish between genotype and phenotype.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students randomly select jelly beans (or other candy) that represent genes for several human traits such as tongue-rolling ability and eye color. Then, working in pairs (preferably of mixed gender), students randomly choose new pairs of jelly beans from those corresponding to their own genotypes. The new pairs are placed on toothpicks to represent the chromosomes of the couple's offspring. Finally, students compare genotypes and phenotypes of parents and offspring for all the "couples" in the class. In particular, they look to see if there are cases where parents and offspring share the exact same genotype and/or phenotype, and consider how the results would differ if they repeated the simulation using more than four traits.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will use toothpicks (representing chromosomes) with dots on them (representing genes) to understand how traits are passed from parents to offspring. They will understand the relationship between genes, chromosomes, and traits.

Type: Lesson Plan

Explore the inheritance of traits using a pedigree chart in this interactive tutorial.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Use Punnett squares to determine the probabilities of genotypes and phenotypes in this original tutorial.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Come investigate heredity using the American alligator to help you understand many of the terms and ideas associated with the passing on of genetic traits from parent to offspring, in this interactive tutorial. 

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn how pedigree charts can represent inheritance patterns and how genetic diseases are passed down through generations in this interactive tutorial.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn to predict the probability of offspring inheriting different traits and combinations of genes using Punnett squares. In this interactive tutorial you also review genotypes and phenotypes.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Explore heredity--how genetic information in DNA is passed from parents to offspring. In this interactive tutorial, you'll see how inherited genetic information impacts traits in offspring.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Compare and contrast asexual and sexual reproduction with Mix the Fish and Stan the Starfish in this interactive tutorial.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn what genetic engineering is and some of the applications of this technology. In this interactive tutorial, you’ll gain an understanding of some of the benefits and potential drawbacks of genetic engineering. Ultimately, you’ll be able to think critically about genetic engineering and write an argument describing your own perspective on its impacts.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn how scientists use models to simplify and understand the world around us. In this interactive tutorial, you'll also explore the benefits and limitations of scientific models.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

In this video, Jim Cox describes cross-fostering as a research method for evaluating behavioral traits in birds.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

Wilbert Butler explains the differences between mitosis and meiosis.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

Dr. David McNutt explains how large clonal plant populations can be analyzed with microsatellite analysis of their DNA.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

A viticulture scientist discusses biotechnology and its impact on society with tendril-loving care.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

DNA extraction, for your choice of strawberries or jellyfish.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Teaching Idea

Do you want to see an idea about teaching eye color patterns and genetics?

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Teaching Idea

This hands-on DNA modeling idea will reinforce your base knowledge.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Teaching Idea

This activity (lab) is designed to help students to learn the critical distinctions between what happens to chromosomes during mitosis vs meiosis. Students manipulate pipe-cleaner chromosomes on a template showing stages of mitosis with one pair of chromosomes until approved by the teacher. Then they repeat the exercise for meiosis until approved. After each phase, students draw in chromosomes on a summary sheet, then help other students. An application phase asks students to show the same thing using two pairs of chromosomes. Students who think they understand the critical distinctions and essential functions of these two processes going in, usually discover that it's not quite what they thought, and come out of this with a sharper understanding. This is best used as a Formative Assessment tool.

Type: Teaching Idea

This step-by-animations explores the stages of two types of cell division, mitosis and meiosis, and how these processes are compared and contrasted to one another and provides a printable version.

Type: Teaching Idea

As a class, students work through an example showing how DNA provides the "recipe" for making our body proteins. They see how the pattern of nucleotide bases (adenine, thymine, guanine, cytosine) forms the double helix ladder shape of DNA, and serves as the code for the steps required to make genes. They also learn some ways that engineers and scientists are applying their understanding of DNA in our world.

Type: Teaching Idea

This minds-on activity is designed to help students review the processes of mitosis and meiosis and to ensure that students understand how chromosomes move during mitosis vs. meiosis. Students arrange the cards from a shuffled deck of the stages of mitosis and meiosis in the sequence of steps that occur during cell division by mitosis and another sequence of steps that occur during cell division by meiosis.

Type: Teaching Idea

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. Scientists used ancient bones to compare Neandertal DNA to that of modern humans from around the globe. The results are surprising: many of us are closer to Neandertals than previously thought. Once considered very unlikely, scientists now believe that humans and Neandertals may have interbred.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. This text highlights the controversy surrounding genetically modified foods and their labeling. The article explains GMOs and their implications for health according to science and industry.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. This article reveals how scientists have found a way to make a synthetic chromosome and insert it into yeast cells. Scientists discovered that this chromosome can alter or create new traits in an organism. This research could lead to creating an entirely synthetic genome, which scientists expect to accomplish in the next few years.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. Studying dog DNA may have many applications including helping scientists to have a better understanding of canine origins and how dogs became domesticated. Understanding and locating certain genes has many breeding applications. Studying and understanding dog diseases may be able to further the study of human diseases.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. The text describes a possible solution to the spread of mosquito-borne illnesses like malaria and dengue fever. Scientists have genetically modified mosquitoes to disrupt their reproductive cycle. The article ends with the concerns of the scientific community about the breeding program, while at the same time showing how several countries are already having success with use of the GM organisms.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. The article describes how scientists have found that Native Americans have ancestral roots in Asia using DNA evidence from a 12,600 year old toddler skeleton from the Clovis culture in Montana.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. Stem cell research findings are discussed with examples of how biotechnology is impacting society. The article explains the different types of stem cells and highlights research on stem cells to cure diseases and help increase quality of life. Ethical questions are addressed using a balanced approach.

Type: Text Resource

This resource comes from the Cold Springs Harbor Laboratory: DNA from the Beginning online module series. There are 41 modules located on this site all focused on DNA and organized by individual concepts. The science behind each concept is explained in each module by: animations, an image gallery, video interviews, problems, biographies, and additional links. This is the 2nd module in the series, and it is focused on how genes come in pairs.

Type: Text Resource

This resource comes from the Cold Springs Harbor Laboratory: DNA from the Beginning online module series. There are 41 modules located on this site all focused on DNA and organized by individual concepts. The science behind each concept is explained in each module by animations, an image gallery, video interviews, problems, biographies, and additional links. This is the 4th module in the series and it is focused on concept that some genes are dominant.

Type: Text Resource

This resource comes from the Cold Springs Harbor Laboratory: DNA from the Beginning online module series. There are 41 modules located on this site all focused on DNA and organized by individual concepts. The science behind each concept is explained in each module by animations, an image gallery, video interviews, problems, biographies, and additional links. This is the 3rd module in the series and it is focused on presenting the concept that genes don't blend.

Type: Text Resource

This resource is a brief TED Ed video that covers Mendel's contributions to the field of genetics. It clearly and concisely explains genotype, phenotype, dominance, and Punnett squares in a kid-friendly way.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This is a brief video that can be used in a 7th grade classroom to demonstrate the process of mitosis. It could be used repeatedly to reinforce the stages as this is typically a difficult concept for middle school age students to comprehend.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

A wonderful interactive animation of cloning that helps increase understanding of how cloning using somatic cell nuclear transfer works.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This website allows students and/or teachers to refresh their memory on terms such as DNA, traits, heredity, and genetics.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

In this video module, students learn how scientists use genetic information from dogs to find out which gene (out of all 20,000 dog genes) is associated with any specific trait or disease of interest. This method involves comparing hundreds of dogs with the trait to hundreds of dogs not displaying the trait, and examining which position on the dog DNA is correlated with the trait (i.e. has one DNA sequence in dogs with the trait but another DNA sequence in dogs not displaying the trait). Students will also learn something about the history of dog breeds and how this history helps us find genes. The methods shown are the same as those used in studies looking for genes in people for diseases like cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. This lesson will take one full class period. In preparation for the lesson, it may be helpful for students to have some basic understanding of what DNA is and that differences in DNA between people can cause genetic disorders. However, these topics are reviewed briefly in the lesson. All necessary handouts and worksheets are downloadable in Word and PDF formats, and students need only paper and pen/pencil to complete the lesson. Other than a few group discussion questions, there are four main in-class activities in this lesson. First, students match 4 dog breeds to 4 breed behaviors. Second, students make a dog breed by choosing founders from 28 dogs. Third, students complete a chart showing 3 DNA positions in 8 dogs to demonstrate understanding of what it means for a site on the DNA to be correlated with a specific trait. Fourth, students use real DNA data from a specific scientific study to find the gene that is altered in boxer dogs displaying the trait of white coat color.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This 13-minute video segment produced by NOVA Science Now explores the work by one committed family and researchers to identify patterns in the genetic information of autism patients.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

The video describes how variation can be introduced into a species.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation