Labrador puppy breeding game
This page provides a set of resources to enable you to play the labrador puppy breeding game. The game demonstrates the concept of dominant and recessive alleles without requiring pupils to have any knowledge of the terms or prior knowledge of the concept. Pupils will investigate simple patterns of inheritance and discover that traits can be inherited without that trait being seen in either parent. The "business" aspect of the game will give pupils the incentive to understand the inheritance patterns and to design the most lucrative cross for their puppy breeding business.
To play the game each pair/ group needs each of the following 3 items;
- Puppy breeding game instructions: The instructions for pupils to follow to play the game.
- Puppy breeding game cards: After printing and cutting, (and sticking together if necessary), one side of each card should have a picture of a black or brown puppy (depicting the coat colour gene that the parent gives to its offspring) and the other side should have the name of the appropriate parent dog. If not printed out double sided they need to be stuck together (to check which colour genes should correspond to which doggy parents see the Teachers' Notes). To increase the longevity of the cards they could be laminated.
- Puppy breeding game pupil answer sheets: This sheet is for pupils to record their results and answers.
If this activity generates any tricky genetics questions please remember that we have a question asking box.
If you experience problems accessing these tools or have any further questions or comments, please email
genejury@ed.ac.uk
