Earth Science Week 8 Wednesday

Questions:

1. Where in the US do you think water supply is greatest?
2. Where in the US do you think water demand is greatest? Explain your thinking.
3. Where do you think population density and distribution has the most impact on water resources?

Biology Block Wednesday Part 2

Students will learn about the causes and effects of deforestation and the role of humans in the process by analyzing and synthesizing information into a one pager and an illustrated story.

Questions:

1. What was your article about during part 1?
2. What stood out to you most in this article?
3. What do you think are possible solutions to deforestation?

1.Research (20-25 minutes)

Choose 1 Area:

Hotspot	Remaining habitat
1	Indo-Burma (southern Asia)	5%
2	New Caledonia (Pacific Islands)	5%
3	Sundaland (Indonesia/Malaysia)	7%
4	Philippines	7%
5	Atlantic Forest (South America)	8%
6	Mountains of Southwest China	8%
7	California Floristic Province (U.S. and Mexico)	10%
8	Coastal Forests of Eastern Africa	10%
9	Madagascar & Indian Ocean Islands	10%
10	Eastern Afromontane (Africa)	11%

Questions:

• What are the main causes of deforestation in this region? 

• Who benefits from this deforestation? How do they benefit? 

• What are the negative consequences of deforestation? For people? For animals? For the environment?

 • Are the trees being replanted? What types of trees? Is the forest being replanted as a diverse ecosystem, as mono-crop with very little diversity? Something else?

Links:
5 of the World's Most Endangered Forests
A Look at Some of the World's Most Endangered Forests
The World's 10 Most Threatened HotSpots
Top 10 Most Threatened Forests

2.Story Board (30-45 minutes)

Imagine a future scene, in 500 years, in which the world has lost most of its forests. Many ecosystems have been lost forever. What happened? How and why did the forests disappear? Write and illustrate (draw or paint) a 4 frame story board. Describe the landscape in the present tense. Describe what happened in the past tense.

Biology Block Part 1 Wednesday

Students will learn about the causes and effects of deforestation and the role of humans in the process by analyzing and synthesizing information into a one pager and an illustrated story.

Questions:

1. What do you think is a the cause of deforestation? Explain your thinking.
2. What role to humans play in deforestation?
3. Where do you think deforestation is happening the most? Explain your thinking.

Biology Week 8 Wednesday

Questions:

1. What was our lab about that we started yesterday?
2. What were we trying to measure?
3. What do you think is carrying capacity of a population?

Biology Block Tuesday Week 2 Part 2

Questions:

1. What did you learn in your research in part 1?
2. What surprises you most about public policy around land use?
3. Do you think our government does a good job of protecting the land (ecosystems and species)? Explain your thinking.

Biology Week 2 Tuesday Part 1

Students will learn about land use/misuse by studying policies/acts/laws and analyzing and interpreting information.

Questions:

1. How does a large human population affect ecosystems and species?
2. Does money play a role in how ecosystems and species are managed? Explain your thinking.
3. How do you think land should (ecosystems and species in it) be managed and controlled?

Biology Week 8 Tuesday

Questions:

1. Why would it be better to use random sampling to measure plant populations instead of animals?
2. Do you think it would be better to use Random Sampling or Mark and Recapture to measure population size of endangered species? Explain your thinking.
3. What does a clustered or clumped population look like? (draw or describe)

Earth Science Week 8 Tuesday

Students will learn about water sustainability and availability by analyzing and synthesizing data and information.

Questions:

1. What have you done in the last couple class periods to make progress toward our learning objective (see above)?
2. What does high population density look like?
3. What does population density have to do with sustainability?

Earth Science Week 8 Monday

Questions:

1. What do you think about the case study you started last week?
2. What do you think it takes to make water use most sustainable?
3. Do you think all places on Earth have the same issues with water sustainability?

Case Studies

1. Thompson (2008). The Aral Sea Crisis. Columbia University.

http://www.columbia.edu/~tmt2120/introduction.htm [Read through the 4 web pages]

2. Symmes, P (2003). River Impossible. Outside, 28(8):64-68, 108-111.

http://www.outsideonline.com/1821746/river-impossible

3. Di Nunzio, J (2013).  Conflict on the Nile: The Future of Transboundary Water Disputes Over the World’s Longest River. Future Directions International. http://futuredirections.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Nile_Conflict_Potential.pdf

4. McKinney, D, Czekanski, AJ, Pitman, SH, Al Awar, Z and Akcay, M (2011). Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, in Transboundary Water Challenge: Case Studies. Foreign Service Institute, U.S. Department of State. Pp. 87-94. http://www.caee.utexas.edu/prof/mckinney/ce397/Readings/TransboundaryWaterIssues.pdf

Biology Block Week 2 Monday Part 2

Questions:

1. What was the most difficult part of creating your infographic? 
2. What grade did you give yourself on your infographic? Explain why.
3. What role did humans play in the endangered species?

Biology Block Week 2 Monday Part 1

Questions:

1. What data did you uncover about your endangered species? (number left? number killed each year?, etc?)
2. What surprises you most about your endangered species? Explain your thinking.
3. What steps do you think would be most helpful in helping endangered species? Try to think of at least 3 things that could be done.

Biology Week 8 Monday

Questions:

1. What was our lab simulation about on Thursday?
2. What does mark and recapture mean?
3. Do you think mark and recapture is an accurate way to measure population size? Explain your thinking.

Earth Science Week 7

Questions:

1. What was your case study about yesterday?
2. What were the drivers of your water issues in your case study?
3. How was agriculture involved in your case study?

Biology Block Week 1 Thursday Part 2

Students will learn about the impact of humans on endangered species by synthesizing information to create an infographic.

Questions:

1. What have you done so far to make progress toward our learning objective (see above)?
2. What new learning have you gained this week about biodiveristy and human impact?
3. What did you find most surprising in your endangered species research?

Link for Infographic 

Biology Block Thursday Part 1

Students will learn about the impact of humans on endangered species by synthesizing information to create an infographic.

Questions:

1. What did you notice yesterday about endangered species during your research?
2. What characteristics of animals or plants do you think make them "valuable"?
3. What do you think happens to ecosystems when species are removed?

Research Questions 

1. What is the common and scientific name of the species?

2. Where does it live?

3. What is it's natural habitat? (describe)

4. What does it eat? What is it's role in the ecosystem?

5. Describe the features of the species, and include a photo. Remember to give credit if you attach a photo to the location of the original photo (such as wikipedia)

6. Describe the threats to the species.

7. Are there any laws or projects that are already in existence to help the animal.

8. Propose two ways in which that the animal can be helped. (explain)

As you design your publication, imagine that you want to convince others to donate to the cause or help the animal in some way. Treat it like a persuasive essay, your goal is to get people interested and to get them involved.

Research Links

Animal Planet

Endangered Species.org

A-Z Animals

Biology Week 7 Thursday

Students will learn about factors that affect population density and distribution by analyzing and interpreting data.

Questions:

1. How does our radish plant lab demonstrate population density?
2. What is the effect of high population density?
3. How do you think scientists collect data on animal or plant populations?

Biology Block Week 1 Wednesday part 2

Questions:

1. Why is biodiversity good for Earth?
2. What is ecosystem stability?
3. Do you think humans are good or bad for ecosystem stability?

Links for Endangered Animals Chart

Animal Planet

Endangered Species.org

A-Z Animals

Biology Block Week 1 Wednesday Part 1

Questions:

1. What was the article you read yesterday about?
2. What surprised you most about the author's point of view? 
3. In the past, how/why have mass extinctions of species occurred? 

Earth Science Week 7 Wednesday

Students will learn about the sustainability of water resources by analyzing, interpreting  and evaluating case studies.

Questions:

1. What do you think sustainable water use means?
2. What factors do you think impact water use sustainability?
3. How can groundwater be used unsustainably? 

Case Studies

1. Thompson (2008). The Aral Sea Crisis. Columbia University.

http://www.columbia.edu/~tmt2120/introduction.htm [Read through the 4 web pages]

2. Symmes, P (2003). River Impossible. Outside, 28(8):64-68, 108-111.

http://www.outsideonline.com/1821746/river-impossible

3. Di Nunzio, J (2013).  Conflict on the Nile: The Future of Transboundary Water Disputes Over the World’s Longest River. Future Directions International. http://futuredirections.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Nile_Conflict_Potential.pdf

4. McKinney, D, Czekanski, AJ, Pitman, SH, Al Awar, Z and Akcay, M (2011). Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, in Transboundary Water Challenge: Case Studies. Foreign Service Institute, U.S. Department of State. Pp. 87-94. http://www.caee.utexas.edu/prof/mckinney/ce397/Readings/TransboundaryWaterIssues.pdf

Biology Week 6 Wednesday

Students will learn about factors that affect population density and distribution by analyzing and interpreting data.

Questions:

1. What does population distribution look like? (draw or describe)
2. What does population density look like? (draw or describe)
3. Describe an example of a plant or animal that demonstrates random distribution (and why they exhibit that pattern).