The fruit fly ("Drosophila melanogaster") is an ideal subject for studying inheritance patterns, Mendel's laws, meiosis, Punnett squares, and other aspects of genetics. Much of what we know about genetics dates to evolutionary biologist Thomas Hunt Morgan's work with mutated fruit flies in the early 1900s. Many genetic laboratories…

Reasoning about and making sense of statistics and probability are essential to students' future success. This volume belongs to a series that supports National Council of Teachers of Mathematics' (NCTM's) "Focus in High School Mathematics: Reasoning and Sense Making" by providing additional guidance for making reasoning and sense making part of…

This report presents mathematics benchmarks organized into instructional sequences by topic. Each sequence is based upon an analysis of the order of content as it appears among a set of highly rated state standards. The report is intended to inform and guide state or district curriculum directors or others who, starting from content that is placed…

Presents activities that center on the excitement of going back to school by collecting and analyzing data and exploring probabilities. Contains reproducible student worksheets. (MKR)

This article describes an innovative lesson that uses the biography "Barbara McClintock: Alone in her Field" (Heiligman, 1994) to integrate genetics, literature, and mathematics as a context for students to investigate patterns on Indian corn. This two-day lesson requires students to estimate, collect data, identify and describe patterns,…

A glyph--short for hieroglyphic--is a form of picture writing that conveys information. This book uses 10 glyphs to teach math concepts that are linked to the new NCTM Standards. There are four key parts to each glyph: (1) a legend (or survey questions); (2) directions for the teacher that tell students what to draw, color, or write based on…

Presents examples to illustrate how conditional probability statements can be used to introduce conditional probabilities, how early applications can be found in sports data, and how conditional probability can be related to data collection and presentation in two-way tables. (MKR)

Described is a unit, SAMPLING, which focuses on developing student understanding of probability and data collection for junior high school students. Activities in SAMPLING incorporate physical materials, simple computer simulations, surveys of subjective data, computer simulations of complex situations, and a culminating activity requiring the…

Presents a game called Push-Penny, played by pushing a coin and having it land on a line, used to teach students to develop intuitive feelings for the consequences of randomness, including data handling and the construction and use of tables and graphs. (ASK)

Describes how Logo computer simulations, or microworlds, were incorporated into a series of lessons on the nature of probability. Data were generated and displayed using Logo. (MKR)

The focus here is on the students' uses for numbers in both school and home settings. The included activities emphasize a growth and development theme involving various aspects of data collection, data interpretation, probability, and statistics. Also included are parent-child extended activity worksheets. (JJK)

Presents 5 school and home activities for the K-2, 3-4, 5-6, and 7-8 levels appropriate for beginning the school year that incorporate problem solving, collecting and analyzing data, and exploring patterns. Topics include a shopping spree, seat assignment, map-interpretation skills, and probability. Includes reproducible worksheets. (MDH)

Presents activities taken from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Addendum Series, grades 5-8, involving data collection and chance. Students determine whether a game is fair based on the data collected and examine rule changes to ensure fairness. (MDH)

Describes four activities for grade levels K-3, 4-5, and 6-8 and for the family that explore statistical concepts using a manipulative familiar to students-SKITTLES candies. Concepts explored include frequency graphs, data collection and analysis, probability, measures of central tendency, averaging, and correlation coefficients. Includes…

The 1989 document, "Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics," provides a vision and a framework for revising and strengthening the K-12 mathematics curriculum in North American schools and for evaluating both the mathematics curriculum and students' progress. This book, one in a series designed to interpret and…