This column focuses on promoting learning through assessment. This month’s issue discusses the “Baby Mice†probe, which is designed for middle and high school students, but it can be used with grades 3–5 to elicit students’ initial ideas about how offspring acquire their traits, without expecting an explanation of the genetic mechanism.
This article really opened up my eyes to the way teachers look at how to teach their students about offspring. This article expressed that by the grade level of fifth-grade students should know that traits are passed on from both parents. This article explains that baby mice activity should be introduced in grade 3 to introduce some ideas about offspring and traits. This article then states that we as teachers need to address these concerns and questions students have about offspring because if not in middle school and so on, the student will be confused. That is when students get introduced to genes and genetic mechanisms for inherited traits. This article opened up my eyes to why we need to explain offspring properly and inherited traits to elementary students because they will continue to learn about this throughout their education.
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