Reproduction Demonstrations

Reproduction demonstrations show how organisms create offspring, whether sexually or asexually. They are included because reproduction is a fundamental concept connecting genetics, growth, and the continuation of life.

Demonstration	Materials	Difficulty	Safety	Summary
Fruit Dissection	★☆☆	★★☆	★☆☆	By dissecting a variety of fruits, students can explore their internal and external structures, recognize similarities among them, and connect these observations to plant reproduction and their origins as flowers.
Exploding Seed Pod Model	★☆☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	In this activity, students build a model of an exploding seed pod using balloons filled with bird seed. When the balloon is popped, the seeds scatter, simulating how plants use mechanical adaptations to disperse seeds away from the parent plant.
Pollination Role Play	★☆☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	Students act out the process of pollination and fertilization by taking on the roles of flower parts and a bee. Through role play, they learn how pollen is transferred from one flower to another, leading to fertilization.
Modelling Stem Cell Development	★☆☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	Students build simple clay or play dough models of the zygote, morula, blastula, and gastrula to visualize where stem cells come from and how cell potency changes from totipotent to pluripotent to multipotent. The activity also introduces the source of embryonic stem cells and contrasts them with adult stem cells.
Flower Dissection	★★☆	★☆☆	★★☆	Students carefully take apart several fresh flowers to identify and compare major plant structures (stem, leaves, petals, stamen, pistil) and relate those parts to pollination and seed formation. Parts are sorted and labeled to compare within a species and across different flowers.
Asexual Propagation in Plants	★★☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	Students learn about asexual plant propagation by taking cuttings from stock plants, rooting them in water or soil, and comparing their growth. The activity demonstrates how new plants can be cloned from parent plants without seeds.
Mitosis in Onion Root Cells	★★☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	Students use digitized images of onion root tips to identify different stages of the cell cycle. By counting the number of cells in each stage, they estimate how much time cells spend in interphase, prophase, metaphase, anaphase, and telophase.
Handshake Activity Disease Transmission	★☆☆	★☆☆	★★☆	This classroom activity demonstrates how easily infections (STIs) can spread by having students shake hands, representing sexual contact. A glove represents condom use, showing its protective effect against infection.
Watching Yeast Make Bubbles	★★☆	★★☆	★☆☆	This demonstration shows how bread yeast ferments sugar to release carbon dioxide, which can inflate a balloon, and allows students to observe live yeast cells under a microscope.
Onion Root Tip Mitosis	★★☆	★★☆	★☆☆	This experiment demonstrates mitosis by preparing and observing stained onion root tip cells under a compound microscope. Students identify the stages of mitosis while understanding why onion root tips are suitable for studying active cell division.
Seed Dispersal	★★☆	★☆☆	★☆☆	This experiment uses real seeds and household items to model four main methods of seed dispersal: wind, water, animals, and mechanical bursting. Students test how different seeds travel and connect adaptations to plant survival strategies.
Brine Shrimp Hatching and Growth	★★★	★☆☆	★☆☆	tudents hatch brine shrimp (Artemia) from eggs and track hatching success and growth over several days using simple equipment. A control culture is compared with single-variable changes to explore what helps or harms development.

Materials
★☆☆ Easy to get from supermarket or hardware store
★★☆ Available in most school laboratories or specialist stores
★★★ Requires materials not commonly found in school laboratories

Difficulty
★☆☆ Can be easily done by most teenagers
★★☆ Available in most school laboratories or specialist stores
★★★ Requires a more experienced teacher

Safety
★☆☆ Minimal safety procedures required
★★☆ Some safety precautions required to perform safely
★★★ Only to be attempted with adequate safety procedures and trained staff