Best Labs

[Lisa]

Okay, what are your best labs. You know, the ones that REALLY help the kids get it. Not just the ones where they follow the instructions and answer the questions.

My best lab is an open ended one on transport. The kids are allowed to design any type of experiment to prove osmosis occurs. They they have to write a full lab report to explain what they did, why, and what they found out.

[Hassan Wilson]

I worked with Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in Long Island, NY at the Dolan DNA Center. They have amazing DNA-genetics labs which I will try this year. Teachers can participate in free professional development and try out the labs at their site.

Other than that, I try to have my students design their own experiments; my favorite labs entailed working with brine shrimp on a student-generated hypothesis or a semi-student designed experiment on Terraqua Columns.

[Sandra Climenhaga]

I am new to high school this year and we started the year with an owl pellet. We set out material like probes, rulers, scales, water ect and gave them a pellet, yellow legal sheet for notes, plate and gloves. All we told them was it was not feces. Prior to this we did the scientific method so they followed that for their investigation. It was great. lots of discussion, comments and pages of notes. Now they will do the write up.
open ended are the best. Just let them go with only a few basics and see how they do.

[Rich Ettinger]

I have a few favorite labs. On the first day of school I do I live crayfish lab. The students observe various methods of locomotion (walking, using the tail to move quickly backwards). During the lab the students discuss adaptations for survival, identify the various appendages and write about their function. I also introduce autotropha, heterotrophs and decomposers. The finishes with me placing carmine solution (carmine dissolved in water) on the sides of the body and the students observe respiration through the gills as the carmine leaves through the mouth.
Asecond favorite lab is the students add diastase to a souble starch solution. The solution is sampled every minute for 15 minutes and tested for starch with Iodine; over time the starch -diastase solution no longer tests positive for starch. The students then create a hypothesis as to what happened to the starch. I collect all of the students solutions and on day 2 the test for the prescence of glucose using Benedict's solution and the students then have to decide if these test supported or refuted their hypothesis

[Allison Milkosky]

My favorite (my student's Favorite!) is the egg lab for osmosis. A lot of schools do it because it works so well. For those that DON'T know it.....put regular un-cooked eggs in vinegar for about 2-3 days, changing the vinegar depending on how many eggs go in it. It dissolves the egg shell and leaves the membrane. The you put one egg in corn syrup and once in water....over night....take the mass before and after....record descriptions of solutions.....yadda yadda......results are pretty dramatic. Then i have my kids pop the eggs with paper clips to feel the texture changes which they love. then collect the garbage in a bag so the sinks don't clog.

[Jon Freer]

Is there anywhere I can find a list of great open-ended biology labs?  I am looking for a teacher's guide to get them rolling.  Clearly, they need some guidance and focus, but exploration is best.  Materials that get them onto the right idea and provide me with a good materials resources would be appreciated. 

 

Anyone have such a thing?

 

Jon

[Courtney Craig]

The open-ended cell transport lab sounds fab!  How do you set this up so that materials are available to students?  What materials do you make available?  How much time do you allow?  On a trimester system, we have VERY little time to spend on choice lab activities.

 

Thanks!