LABORATORY REQUIREMENT: Students who take this course spend a minimum of 30% of their time engaged in laboratory exercises. All DoDEA science courses have this minimum 30% time period for laboratory exercises.

Major Concepts/Content: Human Genetics is an advanced level course designed to provide students with an integrated approach to the study of evolution of genetics as applied to humans.

Major Instructional Activities: Instructional activities will incorporate the philosophy that scientific knowledge is best acquired through inquiry. The course uses a variety of techniques to introduce, stimulate, explore, and reinforce major scientific concepts and theories. Instructional activities will be provided in a classroom or a lab utilizing individualized instruction. Textbooks, simulation projects, hands-on labs, appropriate support software, and Internet access and activities will be incorporated into the class.

Major Evaluation Techniques: All aspects of progress in science are measured using multiple methods such as individual and group performances, interviews, student generated technology projects, lab evaluations, and/or conventional testing.

Essential Objectives: Upon completion of this course, students should be able to:

• Describe through models the chemical makeup of DNA, mRNA, tRNA, and rRNA.
• Recognize and describe the interrelationship between replication, transcription, translation, and protein synthesis.
• Identify the scientists involved with the evolution of the study of Human Genetics and the conflicts that many scientists experience during their course of study.
• Explain the social impact of the Human Genome Project on medical technology, reproductive technologies, the legal system, and cloning.
• Apply science concepts to decision-making based on the genetics of immunity and cancer.
• Discuss Mendel's Law, extensions and exceptions to the his laws, and describe the exceptions such as maternal inheritance, uniparental disomy, transmission of complex traits, sex-linked traits, genomic imprinting, and the inheritance of different levels of sexual identify.
• Describe the stages of meiosis, gamete maturation, prenatal development, and birth defects occurring during the "critical period".

Last Revised: July 21, 2005