My students are excited about studying genetics. Just doing an activity on paper doesn't live up to student expectations. Our classroom isn't a science room, it's too small and designed for lecturing. The Crazy Traits activity is possible in our room, while being fun and really teaches the material.
Our school has magnet programs that include bright and talented students from all over our district.
There is a fascinating mix of students from the inner city and the suburbs; math and science gifted students mingle with performing or visual arts talented students.
A person's status is measured in what he or she can achieve and is willing to work toward. Possibly because of the many types of giftedness and ways to excel that exist here, students usually accept each others' differences without the friction that occurs in many other schools.
My Project
My students need two CPO Crazy Traits Kits for hands-on science materials that they can use in a limited space. I want my students to use the laws and probabilities of genetics to create unique and strange bird-like creatures from Crazy Traits kits. It is very much Mr. Potato Head meets biology class. The workshop I attended at a conference last fall had a room full of veteran and new teachers engaged and laughing through three sample genetics lessons. It is also a fun interactive way to demonstrate to students the relationship between genetic inheritance and environmental adaptation.
Much of the study of genetics is made with models and abstracts because students can't see what is going on.
These kits allow students to build "critters" based on genetic traits so they can actually see what the results are. It then allows them to carry that into how that affects the "critter's" ability to survive in different environments which is a giant conceptual leap. This is Science!
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