October 31: Plant 2nd Gen Fast Plants and Intro Asexual vs. Sexual Reproduction

MS LS 3.2.  Develop and use a model to describe why asexual reproduction results in offspring with identical genetic information and sexual reproduction results in offspring with genetic variation.

LT: I can create a model to describe the relationships between traits, chromosomes, genes, and DNA.
LT: I can explain the benefits of sexual vs asexual reproduction.

Students started call by showing their 7 vocabulary cards (homework from Friday!)  We will use these in the opening activity tomorrow.



We then planted the 2nd generation of Fast Plants.  These are the offspring of the plants that have been growing in our classroom for the past 50 days.  Students need to hypothesize what they think they will look like.


Once planting was complete, we focused on reading about various organisms and investigating whether they reproduce sexually, asexually, or both.  In pairs, students shared reading about two different organisms.  The end goal was to fill out a chart (on paper) for both of their organisms.  We will revisit this tomorrow looking specifically at the pros and cons of sexual and asexual reproduction.

October 28: Concept Map of Basic Genetics

MS LS 3.2.  Develop and use a model to describe why asexual reproduction results in offspring with identical genetic information and sexual reproduction results in offspring with genetic variation.

LT: I can create a model to describe the relationships between traits, chromosomes, genes, and DNA.

• Highlight key parts of Tour of Basic Genetics lesson
• Create concept map - Groups of 4
• Create a list from the concepts you and your team identified. Add additional information if you can.
• Read through the list of concepts. If you have over 15 terms reduce the number to reflect which are the most important.
• Write each concept on a post-it note and arrange them in a way that you think reflects the relationships between the concepts.
• Draw lines showing the relationships among the concepts.
• Label these connecting lines to more to show the connections among them.
• When you are done, take a picture and add it to your Tour of Basic Notes.
• Analyze the concept maps
• Visit two other groups’ maps and identify something your group did not include and something you have in common.
• Jot this on sticky notes and return to your map.
• Revise your map if necessary.
• Post maps in class.
• We will be adding to these maps throughout the unit.

October 27: Tour of Basic Recap and Completion

MS LS 3.2.  Develop and use a model to describe why asexual reproduction results in offspring with identical genetic information and sexual reproduction results in offspring with genetic variation.

LT: I can create a model to describe the relationships between traits, chromosomes, genes, and DNA.

We completed the Tour of Genetics along with an accompanying worksheet, The Tour of Basic Genetics.   We will be using this document to complete a class concept map of key ideas and concepts TOMORROW!

October 26: Insect of the Future

LT: I can explain how natural selection can change traits over time.
LT: I can explain how animal behaviors affect whether or not animals reproduce.

Today we continued to work on our Insect of the Future project.  A link to the directions are here.  The final "poster" is due tomorrow.  Please remember to print this off!!!