Punnett Square Pilot Study

We are conducting a small pilot study to compare how two different modeling activities affect students' ideas about inheritance and natural selection. If you are participating in the pilot study, thank you! You should have been assigned to either the ‘M' or 'P’ condition. If you are teaching multiple sections, please follow the same lesson sequence for all your sections.

Questions? Contact Molly Malone.

1. Follow the suggested implementation for the unit through the Mutt Mixer interactive, which comes mid-way through the Inheritance module.
2. Use either the M or the P lesson (depending on the condition you've been assigned to) with your students to model how alleles are inherited during sexual reproduction.
3. Administer the online multiple-choice quiz. The quiz is designed to take no more than 15 minutes. Students should input the same ID number they used for the unit pretest.
4. Rejoin the suggested implementation sequence, starting with either the optional Cup-a-Genes activity (if you choose to use it) or Heritable or Acquired.

Both lessons are based on the dog traits from Mutt Mixer, and they cover the same learning objectives. As students work through their lessons, they should have access to Mutt Mixer if at all possible. You may wish to refer to the Mutt Mixer Trait Quick Reference pdf. Both are linked below.

• Offspring that arise from sexual reproduction have genetic information from two parents; half of the offspring's genetic information comes from each parent.
• Individuals with two parents have two copies of every gene; the copies may be the same or different.
• Gene versions (alleles) are randomly shuffled with each reproductive event, with offspring inheriting one of each parents' two alleles.

Condition M lesson (pdf)
Condition P lesson (pdf)
End-of-lesson quiz
Mutt Mixer
Mutt Mixer Trait Quick Reference (pdf)