UNIT
4: LESSON 3
WONDER CORN
SUBJECT:
Multidisciplinary
OBJECTIVE:Students
will define the word "biotechnology" and will use their creativity to
invent new kinds of plants that offer benefits to the world.
MEASUREMENT:
Students will be able to define biotechnology as "using a living thing
to make something useful" and will have stretched their minds, imagining
ways that this technology might change the world.
BACKGROUND FOR
TEACHERS:
Biotechnology is
simply using biological processes to make things for humans. Bread,
for example, is made using biotechnology. The biological activity of
the yeast helps dough rise, creating a low-tech product with the help
of active microorganisms.
Since humans have
been making bread for thousands of years, we could say that biotechnology
is an old process. But today when people talk about biotechnology, they
are discussing high-tech applications involving transferring genetic
material between organisms. This process uses the tools of genetic engineering,
or recombinant DNA technology.
STUDENT ACTIVITIES:
1. Ask students
to read Elizabeth Learns Why She Has Blue Eyes,
paying close attention to her insights into new and better kinds of
corn, particularly the "armored corn," that is resistant to insects.
2. Older students
can be given this "biotech quiz" without any introduction. (Worksheet
1) When they're finished, review the correct responses, then continue
with the rest of the lesson.
3. (Younger students
can begin with this yeast/bread example of biotechnology, even baking
bread if you want!):
Talk about
bread making. Explain that using living things (yeast) to make things
we use (bread) is very old. The yeast is alive and as it grows in the
warm water and sugar, it gives off carbon dioxide that causes the bread
to rise.
- Define biotechnology
on the board, or in your own words for younger students.
Biotechnology uses biological processes to make products. It has
been used for centuries to make things, including beer and bread using
yeast. It's a process in which living things are used to make other
things.
4. Explain that
today scientists use other living things, such as bacteria and plants,
to make new products too. This is the new biotechnology, or genetic
engineering. It is not quite the same thing as adding yeast to bread.
It involves moving genes between living things. It changes the traits
of the organism that receives the genes.
- Define genetic
engineering for older students:
Genetic engineering is a new biotechnology. It uses molecular tools
to move genes from one organism to another, changing one or more traits
of the recipient organism.
5. Explain the
process of genetic engineering using this film analogy. If you have
an old movie or video film, use a scissors to "cut" some frames out
and "splice" or "paste" them in different sections. (Example 1)
"Let's say
you and your friends are making a videotape to send into a television
show. You're taping segments of people skiing down "Suicide Hill."
Many people fall. Others swoosh gracefully to the bottom. You'd like
to put together a tape of people falling, one right after the other.
How could you do this?
Well, you could
cut and splice...
Now, suppose
you want to raise a lot of corn in a field. The only problem is that
corn plants are often attacked by corn borer insects. If there were
a way to keep the insects from eating the corn, you could grow more.
A friend of
yours suggests you take a gene (See Unit 4, Lesson
2 from a bacterium that kills corn borers, place it in the genetic
material of the corn plant, then cross this plant with other altered
plants. The genetic material from the bacterium is "cut" with an enzyme,
just like the scissors, then "pasted" into the corn genetic material.
Wow! You'd have a corn borer resistant plant!
Well, it's
not that simple, but is it science fiction? No, it's recombinant DNA
(genetic engineering)."
6. The picture on
this handout illustrates this "cut" and "paste" biotechnology. Older
students could be quizzed on the eight steps. (Example 2)
7. Now for the creative
part! Ask students to brainstorm a list of ways to improve corn and
corn plants. (Unit 1 has information about corn plants). Do not limit
their imagination. Tell them anything is possible for this exercise!
They might want to work in small groups, or teams of two.
- For example:
Corn plants would be better if they could protect themselves from
insects that hurt them (Elizabeth's "armored corn"). Corn plants would
be better if they did not freeze in cold weather, so farmers could
grow them all year. Corn plants would be better if they could grow
without much rain or sunlight. Corn would be better if it had medicine
in it for people (Elizabeth's idea for purple corn with vitamins for
kids.) Corn would be better if were easier to turn into clothes we
could wear. (See Units 8 and 9
for more uses of corn.) Corn would be better if it were easier to
pick. Corn would be better if it would stay fresh longer. ETC!!
8. Now, ask students
to think of something in nature that already has the good thing they
want to see in corn.
- For example:
Is there a plant or other organism not bothered by freezing temperatures?
Is there a plant or other organism that can grow without much rain
or sunlight? Is there a plant or other organism that is easy to pick?
9. Finally, ask
students (or teams) to combine the solution they thought of in #8 with
a corn plant, to make a "Wonder Corn" that can solve the problem they
thought of in #7.
- For example,
since a pine tree does not freeze, a student could imagine a Wonder
Corn that can grow all winter growing in pine trees...
The purpose of this
exercise is to allow students to imagine what might be possible, NOT
what is practical. (Older students in the math or social studies choices
can discuss feasibility and ethical issues!)
Then ask students
to complete one or more of the following:
- Art: Draw
their "Wonder Corn." (Or build it from any material they choose.)
- Language Arts:
Write an essay about their "Wonder Corn" describing how important
this new corn will be for the world.
- Math:
Develop a business plan, complete with financial budgets, for getting
this corn to market, and then selling it.
- Social Studies:
Act out a debate between two political candidates discussing the
ethics, or the pros and cons, of their "Wonder Corn" creation.
- Music:
Write a tune with words, to be used as a radio commercial for their
"Wonder Corn."
Acknowledgements:
Some of the material
in this section was derived from the book Field of Dreams: Making Sense
of Biotechnology in Agriculture, published by the National 4-H Council,
found on the Internet at www.fourhcouncil.edu.
