Lisa’s Fingerprints
Written by Mary O’Neill, this is a poem about individuality written from a child’s point of view. In the poem, Lisa ponders those things which make her unique, even though she has her mother’s nose, her father’s eyes, and her uncle’s toes. Lisa decides to celebrate her nonconformity by wondering if the animal kingdom shares the same distinction within the world of hoof, paw, and fin.
Before reading the poem with the children, ask them if any of them look like other members of their family. Talk about how this makes them feel. Are there twins in your classroom or school?
Next, have the students make thumbprints using washable ink or watercolor paint. Have the students work in pairs as they compare and contrast their fingerprints using a magnifying glass. The children can compare the size of their fingerprints, the individual whorl, or swirling patterns, the looping patterns made by the impressions, and the arch diameters.
You can make a clever bulletin board of classroom poster by making a “Guess Who” title and displaying the fingerprints along with clues to their identity. The clues can be written in riddle form, such as, “I am tall, I like to run fast, and my birthday is in the same month as Halloween. Who am I?” The answers can be written on the back of the cards, folded under, or on an answer key.
Whisper Down the Lane
This is a simple activity that should illustrate to the children that written instructions are accurate. Choose a child to write down three directions in order. An example might be, “touch your nose, hop three times, and turn around twice.” Have the student whisper the three directions to one student, who will whisper the directions to another, passing the instructions in this way to the rest of the class. When the message has reached the entire class, have them perform the three tasks in order when you give a signal. The children will laugh at each other when they see that they are not all doing the same thing. Now have another child come up with her own list of three directions, and write them on the board. Hopefully, the children will be more successful with these written directions. Try to increase the level of difficulty by adding more instructions to the list.
Finish by discussing why a written list is accurate. Children should be able to develop the idea that a written list can be read and understood by all those trained to do so. Because the list is written down, those who need to use the list do not need to rely on their memory. Also spend some time here discussing communication in general. How did the children feel when they were unsure of what they were supposed to do? Why is clear communication important? Who needs to be a good communicator? Be sure to discuss ways for everyone to be better communicators in the classroom, and at home.
The Gathering of the David Bernsteins
This story, written by Johanna Hurwitz, is about third grader David Bernstein, who has three other Davids in his class. He longs for a unique, exotic, name. When his teacher assigns a book report, promising extra credit for “fat books,” David chooses the fattest book he can find-the Manhattan phone book. Therein he finds seventeen David Bernsteins. As David’s birthday approaches, he decides he wants to meet all the David Bernsteins in New York City. He invites all seventeen to his birthday party. Seven David Bernsteins accept the invitation, and the eight Davids enjoy dinner together. They agree that it’s what you do, not your name, that makes you a unique person.
After reading the story, think about the things that the class has learned about genetics and heredity. Make a classroom chart that lists two general categories that pertain to the David Bernsteins. The first list will show the “genetic David Bernstein.” This list will include things such as eye color, hair color, number of fingers and toes, etc. The second list is the “individual David Bernsteins.” This list will include occupation, schooling, type of clothes and hobbies. Discuss ways in which the students are like all these David Bernsteins, and ways in which they are different.
Clothespins and Donuts
Read the following story to the class, and then use the patterns to cut out lots of red, yellow, green, and blue clothespins and act out the story. This activity illustrates how only a few elements, (nucleotides), are needed to produce many combinations.
Story
DonutArama makes twenty kinds of donuts. The donuts are so good that people come from all over to buy these donuts. Each customer wants to have exactly the donuts that are his or her favorite. But sometimes the donut clerk made mistakes.
At first, the clerk tried shouting the donut orders to the kitchen staff, but that resulted in too many mistakes. Written orders didn’t work either, because the kitchen staff couldn’t read the clerk’s handwriting. Then someone thought up the idea of using clothespins hung on a pulley to transmit the orders to the kitchen.
The clothespins came in four colors. The donuts came in twenty flavors. The question was to figure out a way for the four colored clothespins to represent the twenty varieties. So the clerk worked out a code.
He first tried using combinations of two colors of clothespins. But he realized that this would not be enough combinations to code the the twenty flavors of donuts. But a three clothespin code using the four colors of the clothespins would produce more combinations than he needed! So he and his staff worked out and memorized a code. Red + blue + yellow = jelly; yellow + red + green = chocolate, and so on until each of the twenty flavors had a code. As the clerk took the orders he put the correct color pattern on the pulley. In the kitchen, the decoder read the code, and then hung the proper donut on the hook next to it. The packager took the donuts off the hook and put the donuts in their proper place in the box. From that point on, things worked wonderfully. Also, the cook in the kitchen was able to develop new flavors of donuts, because there were many combinations of clothespins that could still be used!
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A Celebration of Life!
OBJECTIVES
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-We are alike in many ways, and some of the things we have in common are crucial to our existence as a species.
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-We are different in many ways, and some of those things are those which we chose; others are characteristics we inherited.
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-We can learn how to be happy for the things we are that we can’t change, and to also appreciate unchangeable differences in others.
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-We may want to improve or change something about us, and through practice and planning, we can do just that.
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-We can learn to help others be better people by using strategies that encourage us to see others more positively.
KEY VOCABULARY: physical trait, feeling characteristic, behavior, compare.
ACTIVITIES
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1-“Physical-Behavior Trait Chart,” encourages the children to be more objective in their judgements of themselves and others.
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2-“Do Boys and Girls Think Differently?” is a activity which asks students to respond to a series of 10 questions about boys and girls.
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3-“Hands Down!” is a comparison activity which looks at finger-length differences between boys and girls.
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4-“What Things Can We Be?” unrolls colorful streams of “Traits and Trys” which illustrate the difference between a recipe for life and a recipe for pro-social behavior.
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5-“Wonder Woman” is the story of Jackie Joyner-Kersee and the effort she puts into being her best. Written be sports journalist Joy Duckett Cain, this story demonstrates the perfect marriage of the inherited and developed self.
Do Boys and Girls Think Differently?
Teacher dialogue: “Now that we have been talking and reading about how we are all alike and how we are often different, we are going to do an experiment. This experiment will get us thinking about the differences between boys and girls and how much we know about each other. But before we answer the questions, I want us to read them to ourselves and make a few predictions. How many students think that boys will score better on this test? How many students think that girls will score better on this test? Now, quietly take the test yourself.”
At this point, after the children have taken the test, have them pass their test to a neighbor for scoring. The answers are as follows:
Men-1,2,5,7,8,9,10
Women-3,4,6
“Obviously, the better you scored, the more you know about differences between girls and boys. Are these differences genetic, or are they ideas that are learned during life?”
Teacher note: The results in this informal survey are a product of x-linked color-blindness, the increased incidence of gout in males, and other sex-dependent genetic differences. For more background on these traits, refer to selections from the bibliography.
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GENDER DIFFERENCE TEST
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1. Who sleeps more?M F
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2. Whose eyes can’t see the color red? M F
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3. Whose forehead is more likely to feel warm? M F
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4. Whose brain will recover faster from a stroke? M F
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5. Who is more likely to hiccup? M F
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6. Whose thumb is more likely to ache when it rains? M f
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7. Who is more likely to complain of a painful toe? M F
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8. Who is more likely to gasp for air in the bedroom? M F
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9. Who is more likely to wake up in the middle of the night with a pain in the stomach? M F
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10. Who has more red blood cells? M F
Hands Down!
Teacher: “Now we are about to do an experiment that demonstrates a small but surprising difference between boys and girls. We know that we are what we look like, and how tall or short we are, because of the genes we inherited from our parents. Let’s take a close look at our hands. There is a gene that causes the index finger to be shorter than the ring finger. This gene happens to be dominant in boys. Therefore, many boys have this trait. I will draw a straight line on the blackboard, and I will ask for some volunteers. (Make sure everyone has a chance to do this activity.) Put your ring finger (the one next to the pinky) against this line. If you are a girl, your index finger (the one next to the thumb), will probably reach above the line. If you are a boy, your index finger will probably not touch the line, because it is shorter. Try this experiment out with your family at home. Make a chart that displays the results of your experiment!
Here are some other interesting differences between boys and girls.
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-At birth, most boys are larger than girls, and they have larger hearts, lungs, and brains.
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-At birth, most girls are more mature than boys, with a more highly developed nervous system. Girls also have a faster heartbeat.
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-Female infants are more interested in colors; male infants are more interested in patterns.
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-Girls stop growing before boys, boys continue to grow until they are older.
Think about other ways that you notice boys and girls to be different. Do you think these differences are genetic?
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