HS-LS3 Heredity: Inheritance and Variation of Traits
- Health & Medicine
Global problem solving gets personal
Students will think about how communities connect on local and global scales through the lens of COVID-19 vaccine distribution and consider why global collaboration in STEM is crucial for solving some large-scale issues.
- Health & Medicine
Counting on COVID-19 vaccines
Students will answer questions about the online Science News article “Global inequity in COVID-19 vaccination is more than a moral problem,” which explores the scientific and economic impacts of the failure to fairly distribute vaccines globally. A version of the story, “Vaccine inequity will prolong pandemic,” appears in the March 27, 2021 issue of Science News.
- Science & Society
Diversity in science
Students will explore diversity in the STEM community and discuss how future textbooks might highlight the scientific contributions of the women who won the 2020 Nobel Prize in chemistry. Students also will research and present on the achievements of women in STEM throughout history.
- Health & Medicine
Collaborating to stop an epidemic
Students will imagine that they are officers at the World Health Organization and will work in groups to develop action plans to prevent the spread of a new virus, such as coronavirus.
- Health & Medicine
The path from outbreak to pandemic
Students will explore the definitions of outbreak, epidemic and pandemic and research how an outbreak becomes an epidemic or pandemic.
- Genetics
Cats and Punnett squares
Scientists would like to breed cats that don’t trigger allergies in people. By constructing and analyzing a Punnett square for two low-allergen cats, students will review key concepts including patterns and probabilities of inheritance, genotype, phenotype, genes, alleles, chromosomes and mutations.
- Health & Medicine
The quest to fend off cat allergies
Students will answer questions about the Science News article “How to lick cat allergies,” which explores some potential solutions to prevent and calm allergic reactions.
- Genetics
Taking charge of allergies
Students will identify and categorize various approaches to fending off cat allergies. After discussing the approaches, students will apply similar problem-solving strategies to a new allergen.
- Health & Medicine
Your nose is running
Students will practice making predictions and drawing conclusions. The activity will help students understand how infections spread, especially among organisms living in close proximity.
- Earth
Dissect a scientific argument
These discussion prompts ask students to evaluate a scientific argument using the claim, evidence, reasoning model.
- Climate
Fungal threats on the rise?
Students will answer questions based on the Science News article “Climate change may raise the risk of deadly fungal infections in humans. One species is already a threat.”
- Science & Society
The great gene-editing debate
Students will research and debate a contentious issue, arguing an assigned viewpoint based on scientific evidence. This debate is focused on gene editing for the creation of human babies, but can be easily adapted for other topics.
