Have each student bring a photo of themselves as a baby, then a photo of their mother and father. Collect these photos from the students and attach each group of three photos with a paper clip. Randomly pass them around the room, giving each student a set of photos from another student. Have each student observe the traits they see and try to pinpoint which student they have. Be sensitive to the fact that some students may be adopted or could otherwise have trouble obtaining photos of their biological parents.
Have students create a creature out of DNA strands. Create DNA strands on small strips of paper with a graphic of a strand on one side and the trait that strand codes for on the other. For example, on the back of a DNA strand it says "blue eyes," "long legs," "pointy ears," or "dark brown fur." Once a student collects all the traits to build a creature, the student draws it out on a piece of paper. Working backwards using the traits of the creature as a guide, the student then draws two parents who, cumulatively, would create the combined characteristics of their offspring. Each student then presents their creature and its parents to the class.
This activity is adapted from Discovery Education. To begin, review the general pollination process with students. Have students search the school library and find books, movies and photos to show how bees and butterflies pollinate different types of flowers. Have each student pick a specific flower and draw a comic scene-by-scene illustrating the pollination process. In this comic, scene one would show a bee flying off in search of food. Scene two would show the bee feeding on a flower. Scene three would show the bee flying off again and landing on another flower in scene four. Scene five shows the pollen from the first flower rubbing off on the second flower. This activity teaches students about reproduction, the precursor to heredity.
This activity is adapted from Teacher Vision and introduces kids to the father of heredity studies, Gregor Mendel. Split students into even groups and give each a paper bag full of gummy bears. Have each group dump out the gummy bears and count how many there are. Label this number as the F1 generation on a piece of paper. Next, have groups separate gummy bears based on phenotypes, or color, face and body shape, or another visible physical trait. Encourage students to be creative, not just grouping gummy bears by color alone. Students justify why they grouped certain gummy bears together, then list the probable genotypes for the phenotypes they choose, what the genotypes for the original parental cross were and the phenotypes of the parents. Finally, have students graph their results in a Punnett square to check their work.