| Grade Level | System Requirement | Product Number |
|---|---|---|
| Grades 3-6 | Apple 128K | A218 |
| In this simulation, your students put into practice Mendel’s genetic discoveries about heredity, dominant and recessive genes, and natural selection. They design experiments involving the selection of beetles and then observe their offspring. The ultimate challenge for kids is to create a population of beetles with physical traits that enable them to avoid detection by a predator. | ||
Introduction
Invisible Bugs is a discovery-learning simulation that capitalizes on students’ natural curiosity and encourages them to use it while developing appropriate scientific process or thinking skills and learning appropriate basic scientific content
Invisible Bugs is part of MECC’s Science Inquiry Collection. Like all the packages in this collection, Invisible Bugs features a strong process orientation while presenting material that is firmly anchored in the elementary and junior high school science curriculum.
Invisible Bugs challenges students to rediscover basic Mendelian genetics. Their task is to determine not only that the physical characteristics of some delightful beetle bugs are inherited, but also how they are inherited. The students make this determination by selecting sets of parents and observing their offspring. As the parents are selected, the students carefully observe and compare characteristics, drawing conclusions and making predictions about future crosses.
The information collected will enable students to determine how each characteristic is inherited. Finally, they are introduced to the relationship between genetic variation and natural’ selection. They are challenged to produce a population of bugs that, by virtue of their back patterns (protective coloration), will be able to avoid predation.
Science process skills developed by Invisible Bugs include:
- observing;
- communicating;
- inferring;
- comparing;
- organizing;
- relating;
- designing an experiment; and
- estimating .
Life science concepts addressed by or related to Invisible Bugs include:
- continuity;
- heredity;
- dominant and recessive genes;
- basic Mendelian genetics;
- adaptation;
- and natural selection.