Write a blog entry discussing the results of your experiment. You will include a picture at a later date. Answer the questions below in complete sentences.
1. What ’seed type’ were you in charge of?
2. When you looked at all of the results from your groups, did the seeds germinate the same in all salt conditions? Explain.
2. Did plants grow to the same height in all salt conditions? Explain.
3. Did the same number of plants grow in all salt conditions? Explain.
4. How does salt affect each kind of plant?
a) Barley—
b) Corn—
c) Pea-
d) Radish–
What were some factors that you might change for next time?
Here is the story you were told about before doing the investigation:
Farmer Johnson lives near the ocean. He usually irrigates his crops with river water, but there is a drought and there just isn’t enough river water for his radishes, barley, corn, and peas. But there is plenty of seawater. His question is, “Can I use a mix of sea water and fresh water to grow these plants?”
Now that you’ve done the experiment, help Farmer Johnson decide what to do about water.
Write a letter to Farmer Johnson with your recommendations. Consider the concentrations of salt and how the several kinds of seeds were affected.
Have you ever heard of Brine Shrimp? Ok, well what about a Sea Monkey? No? You must have heard of Artemia then.
Well, they are all the same thing, and they are not shrimps at all! They are crustaceans and they start out the size of the period at the end of this sentence. Adults grow to about 1cm long. They don’t live in oceans but have adapted to life in salt lakes and ponds. The most important environmental factor influencing their survival is salt.
Why are we learning about them? We are trying to determine the range of tolerance to salt by creating an experiment with 4 different plastic cups. Each cup has a different amount of salt in it ranging from 0 spoons of salt up to 3 spoons of salt. Today we found out that Brine Shrimp did not hatch in the cup with no salt and most hatched in the cup with 2 spoons of salt.
Take a look at the cool video we were able to capture using our new digital microscope. It is magnified at 60x its normal size. Double click on the image to start it.
Two students look into the plastic cups, looking for signs of life. The hatched brine shrimp are VERY tiny!
Today our class watched a portion of BBC’s Planet Earth series called Saving the Species. We only watched the first 20 minutes, and in just that amount of time, we had lots of questions, reactions, thoughts, feelings, learnings about the video.
Our class came up with a variety of responses which you can see below:
• Elephants are being poached for ivory, meat, clothing
• Surprised how scientists in the past used toads for research
• Don’t understand how people are proud to poach animals
• Can humans become extinct?
• Half of the world frogs are endangered—shocking
• If they disappear…what are the implications?
• Humans are both making problems and trying to solve them
• Ibex are going to become extinct because of their habitat they live in
• What will earth look like in 50 years?
• We need to think ahead–think of our future
• I wonder how long it will take until all tropical habitats are gone?
• People in the Ethiopian war were eating animals (Ibex)
• This is sad that these animals are being killed
• If people know it’s bad, why are the animals still being killed?
• Why do poachers kill animals? Are they that desperate for money?
• Surprised that the soldiers would kill and eat the Ibex. Why not other animals?
• How might animals that are dying, affect the earth?
• Half of the world’s amphibians vanished—even though they are small, it will make a big impact on the world
• Why must humans ignore the warnings? (money? We’re more important? Don’t care? Maybe we don’t see it as that big of a problem? I’m not going to be around much longer, so why should this matter to me?)
Ridge brought up a great question, which is the last bullet: Why must humans ignore the warnings? I’ve asked the students to reflect on this:
Do you think humans are ignoring the warnings? Why or why not? Do you think you personally may be ignorning the warnings? If so, why? If not, how are you making a difference?
Our Gr.5 class is still investigating all about variables! We are flying airplanes, launching boats and so much more. I put out the challenge to my class–and now to all of you bloggers–to find out the answer to this question:
Which freezes faster: a cup of sugar water or just plain water?
You will need to hold all of the variables constant except the one you are testing! Decide what type of cup or bowl you will use, how much sugar you will use, how much water you will use. Measure the amount of water using a measuring cup and keep the amount the SAME for both cups. Be sure to check your cups at regular intervals, such as every hour, so you can track the results.
How would you keep track of the results? Try it out in your freezer! Post your results in the comment section of this blog post! I can’t wait to hear how it went.
Have you ever thought about what your life would be like without ANY technology? What would you do after you finished your homework? What would you rather do if you had a choice: play outside or play a video game? These are questions I never had a choice with when I was younger, and certainly not when my parents were your age. Internet was not an option when I was in elementary school and it wasn’t until I was in high school that the Internet became widely available. I remember learning one of the most useful skills ever–typing–on a typewriter when I was in Gr.9. JJJ space, FFF space. Those of you who took typing know what I am talking about, right?
I wonder how much students appreciate technology when they have literally had it their whole lives. What about the people around the world who DON’T have access to computers? I realize that’s a whole other ball of wax, but it’s an important question that we don’t think about too often. Have a look at the both videos I’ve posted. Write a comment about what you think based on what you heard.
Air traffic control today was busy as all 21 of our students were working in groups to conduct test flights for their FOSS planes. Our students will be blogging tonight to share with you how they constructed the planes and what they have been doing with them. Be sure to check out their blogs to learn about their experiences.
We are still learning about variables, but this time we will be manipulating certain things on our planes. The students are using their Science journals/notebooks to record their Flight Logs what predictions and observations they are making through this process.
We were all very excited to see our planes in action. Check out this video of one of the groups:
Welcome back to our blog! I love to share what we’ve been doing in our class lately. Today I will focus on science. We are using the FOSS (Full Option Science System) kits and our current unit is Variables. The students love working in various groupings, exploring what effects changing one variable at time, will have on an outcome. In the picture to the left, Migo, Angelica, Ridge and Tomer are investigating how many coins (baht) will it take to sink the paper ‘boat’. Students record their predictions and results.
Stay tuned for more snippets of our learning. Thanks for visiting!
Welcome back to our blog! I love to share what we’ve been doing in our class lately. Today I will focus on science. We are using the