Essential Question: How does DNA code for traits and enable the continuation of species?

Life consists not simply in what heredity and environment do to us, but in what we make out of what they do to us.

–Harry Emerson Fosdick

Student Reaction

I will always know why I can’t roll my tongue. For years I thought it was something I could learn how to do. Now I know that it is because my Mom and Dad passed down the gene that doesn’t let me roll me tongue. I understand now how genetics works and why sometimes genes skip a generation.

–Ashley

National Science Education Standards

• Science as Inquiry Standards
• The molecular basis of heredity
• Evidence, models and explanation
• Form and function
• Science as inquiry
• Science in personal and social perspectives
• History and nature of science

What issues are raised as scientists discover and take advantage of the mechanisms of cell growth to prolong human life?

With great power comes great responsibility.

–Peter Parker, in the movie “Spider-Man”

Student Reaction

The Cell Cycle is never ending.

–Luke

National Science Education Standards

• The Cell
• Change, constancy and measurement
• Evolution and equilibrium
• Science as Inquiry Standards
• Science in personal and social perspectives

Essential Question: How does variation in organisms lead to change over time?

It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.

–Author unknown, commonly misattributed to Charles Darwin

Student Reaction

Evolution is like upgrading!

–Taylor

National Science Education Standards

• Biological evolution
• Evolution and equilibrium
• Evidence, models and explanation
• Scientific inquiry
• Science in personal and social perspectives
• History and nature of science

Why is there such a diversity of adaptations among organisms and how do we organize this diversity?

In all works on Natural History, we constantly find details of the marvelous adaptation of animals to their food, their habits, and the localities in which they are found.

–Alfred Russel Wallace

Student Reaction

I will remember that adaptations usually occur through random mutations, not the need to change.

–Matt

National Science Education Standards

• The behavior of organisms
• Biological evolution
• Form and function
• Systems, order and organization
• History and nature of science

Essential Question: What does the statement, “You are what you eat” mean?

Man is what he eats.

–Ludwig Feuerbach

Student Reaction

What I will remember about transformation is that in an explosion, matter is transformed and energy is released. The coolest part about it is that the same thing happens in our bodies (but on a smaller scale)! Food is broken down so we can build ourselves and use the energy “calories”.

–Breanna

National Science Education Standards

• Matter, energy and organization in living systems
• The cell
• Form and function
• Change, constancy and measurement
• Science as inquiry

Essential Question: How do human actions affect the “circle of life”?

So divinely is the world organized that every one of us, in our place and time, is in balance with everything else.

–Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

Student Reaction

I’ll probably remember photosynthesis and respiration.

I understand how they work now and I even know the equations! I've learned that without one we couldn’t have the other. We need plants to provide oxygen so I’m more interested in the environment. There is a whole cycle that goes on between humans and the earth.

–Lindsey

National Science Education Standards

• Science as Inquiry Standards
• The interdependence of organisms
• Matter, energy and organization in living systems
• The cell
• Form and function
• Evolution and equilibrium
• Change, constancy and measurement
• Science in personal and social perspectives
• Science as inquiry