Inherited Traits & DNA Station Lab - MS

This modular, student-led activity is the perfect way to keep your middle schoolers engaged while exploring the structure of life and inherited traits. With ready-to-use materials and a flexible design, you’ll save hours of prep while giving students ownership of their learning.

In this station lab, students will learn how to identify and compare the characteristics of inherited traits through a variety of hands-on, digital, and independent activities.

Texas Teachers: This lab aligns with the 2017 TEKS.

Differentiated, Modular, and Student-Centered

Each station lab includes eight core stations plus one challenge station, giving every learner a personalized experience. Teachers take on the role of facilitator while students work independently or in small groups.

All signage, passages, resources, and task cards are included—making this lab easy to run in any classroom. The Explore It! station may require a few common lab materials, but everything else can be done with basic supplies or digitally.

Best of all, these stations are designed for both in-class and virtual learning, with files compatible with PowerPoint and Google Slides.

The Stations

Input Stations – Learn New Concepts

• Explore It! – Hands-on demo or digital drag-and-drop activity to connect ideas through application

• Read It! – Short, differentiated reading passages (English & Spanish) with comprehension questions

• Research It! – Online investigation with guiding tasks and questions

• Watch It! – Short video with reflection and response prompts

Output Stations – Show Understanding

• Organize It! – Hands-on card sorts or digital sorting activities

• Illustrate It! – Student sketches and models to reinforce recall

• Write It! – Open-ended short-answer prompts in complete sentences

• Assess It! – Task card questions and a vocabulary-in-context writing activity

Bonus Station – Challenge It!
Perfect for early finishers or advanced learners, this extension station offers crosswords, games, and mini-projects to push learning further.

Why Teachers Love It:

• Differentiated for every learner

• Flexible for digital or print use

• Ready to run with minimal prep

• Engages students with multiple modalities

This station lab is also included in the full Inherited Traits 5E Lesson Plan, which adds presentations, interactive notebooks, assessments, student projects, and more to build a complete middle school science unit.

This is a finished product; it will be updated with formatting or corrections as needed. Future improvements and new features will be sold as a separate product.