Biology - HOT Science Lab

Teacher
Differences in Similar Phenotypes
NGSSS:
SC.912.L.16.1 Use Mendel‘s Laws of Segregation and Independent Assortment to analyze
patterns of inheritance. (AA)
Purpose of Lab/Activity:
To observe differences in phenotypes for a particular trait among individuals in a
population.
To determine the reason for the differences in phenotypes for a particular trait among
individuals in a population.
Prerequisites:
Before conducting this activity, the teacher should have covered Mendel‘s Laws of Inheritance.
Students should know the meanings of terms such as alleles, dominant, recessive, phenotype,
genotype, homozygous, and heterozygous. They should also be familiar with inheritance
patterns caused by various modes of inheritance, including dominant, recessive, co-dominant,
sex-linked, polygenic, and multiple alleles.
Materials (per group):
Metric ruler
Meter Stick
Procedure: Day of Activity:
Before
activity:
During
activity:
What the teacher will do:
a. The day before this activity, you may want to place ―Table 2 - Class Data on
Right-hand Width and Length‖ on the board in front of the room.
b. In order to access prior knowledge and detect any misconceptions, review
Mendel‘s Laws of Segregation and Independent Assortment. Also, review
the meaning of the vocabulary words which are located in the student‘s
hand-out.
c. Have students read the entire lab, and ensure they understand the
procedures.
d. Assign each student a partner.
e. Demonstrate to students how to measure the length and width of their right
hand in centimeters. Some students may need assistance making
measurements in metric.
What the teacher will do:
a. Circulate around the room and monitor students to ensure they are
accurately measuring the length and width of their right-hand.
b. In order to minimize ―traffic flow‖ in the classroom, select a student to
record class data to minimize any errors in recording data.
c. Have all students involved in tabulating the results of the class
measurements by totaling the number of males and females with each
hand length and width and recording in Table 3 and Table 4.
d. The teacher has the option to include the data from all the classes running
this experiment. Table 5 and Table 6 is provided that will allow the
tabulation of several classes of data.
Biology HSL Page 175
Curriculum and Instruction