These activities may be used to prepare students for the field trip or as classroom resources.
Traits
Activity 1 - Family genetic traits
This take-home activity has students compare their traits to other family members. The complete activity with accompanying material can be found at the Utah Learn Genetics web site. We have adapted their resource so less copying is required. Family traits pages
Activity 2 - Classroom Traits
Use the list of traits from Inherited Human Traits a Quick Reference to see what combinations of traits your class has. Students love to share their unique traits such as being double jointed or able to wiggle their ears.
Activity 3 - Graphing Traits
Students collect data on the traits of classmates and then create different types of graphs to illustrate how common a trait is. Look at traits that have the greatest variation and encourage the students to break items down on a scale to make graphing more interesting. This is a great activity for integrating science and math.
Activity 4 - Inquiry
Students create questions about traits and investigate if their hypothesis is true. Questions could be related to ratios of a trait in the classroom, correlating two different traits or seeing if a trait is more common among boys or girls. Can boys jump farther than girls? Do tall people jump the farthest? Check in advance to make sure that students are not using traits that may be racially sensitive.
Review
Learned versus Genetic Traits
The Hawaii 5th grade curriculum differentiates between learned behaviors and genetic traits. The distinctions are not always that clear as animals can only learn what they are genetically capable of doing.
Learned Behavior
www.seaworld.org/animal-info/info-books/training/index.htm
This is a great site for terminology and simple explanations of animal behavior. The pictures will give students ideas for further research projects. The careers section explains how they decide who to hire for highly competitive animal training positions. Go to the home page to find teacher resources. A large selection of science activities are available under the heading called Classroom Activities.
Learned Behavior Game
As a follow-up to animal learned behaviors, have the class try to teach a classmate what to do using animal training techniques. Game description
After the students have successfully taught a behavior, ask them if they could teach the classmate to jump to the ceiling. Show them that we can only learn what are genetic characteristics allow.
Traits and survival
Show students pictures of animals and have them identify structures that will help them survive. Use Venn diagrams to have students compare animals.
http://www.uen.org/Lessonplan/preview.cgi?LPid=11332
Human variation and survival
This link will give teachers some background information for discussing skin color with students. A scientists discusses her research on the relationship between ultraviolet light and vitamins. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/07/3/text_pop/l_073_04.html
Integrating Traits with Math
This lesson has the students create a graph for their classmates hand size. It can be used as an example for looking at other traits.