Science

Since my last post we have covered the following topics in Environmental Science:
Evolution and Natural Selection
Primary and Secondary Succession, with special emphasis given to successional changes on Mount St. Helens
Symbiosis and Coevolution: mutualism, commensalism, parasitism (Watched a great video called “Living Together”–fantastic, a classic)
Predation: how to avoid predation and how to be a predator
Ecological Niche: Fundamental vs. Realized
Limiting Resources
Keystone species such as fig trees and top predators
Species Richness

The boys took a quiz on this material and we set up our Winogradsky Columns for our bacterial study. That seems to be going well. They are taking water quality tests each week and photographing the changes seen in each column. We will follow for the next five weeks.

Then, last week we tackled Biomes, both terrestrial and aquatic. The boys had to create tables to compare the climate, productivity, species type, limiting factors etc. for each terrestrial biome. I went over freshwater and salt water systems in class. They also had a quiz at the end of the week, which they thought was very hard. I have no finished grading it yet.

This week we are moving into Population Dynamics and Ecology (one of my favorite topics actually). We are going over:
Population density
Growth rate calculations
Environmental Resistance and Carrying Capacity
Log curves vs. exponential growth curves
Reproductive strategies: r-selected species vs. K-selected species
Survivorship curves
Density dependent vs. independent limiting factors
Predator-Prey relationships
Boom or Bust relationships
Thomas Malthus and predicting human population growth and carrying capacity
Demographics
Age structure diagrams of developed, developing and underdeveloped countries

Good stuff! They have calculations to do tomorrow and in our double period we are going to work on exponential growth and they will research Thomas Malthus’ ideas. I also have a lab for growing radishes to illustrate competition of resources, but that will have to wait until next week as they did not include enough radish seeds. It is always something.

This week we tackled energy, ecosystems and ecology…the boys really liked it and hopefully, their quizzes will reflect their understanding. We watched Planet Earth’s “Into the Wilderness” on Wednesday’s double period, I highly recommend it. It did a great job discussing wild areas on the Earth and how we should manage them, what impacts management has and what role population/consumption plays in all of this. We then moved on to a more in-depth look at thermodynamics and energy/biomass/number pyramids in ecosystems.

Next week we will start evolution/natural selection/interspecies competition…should be fun. I just assigned a 4-5 page paper on a natural area of their choice. That is due in two weeks. They seem surprised there is so much work…love that.

Environmental Science is going well so far. We started the year with an activity on the Tragedy of the Commons. It was meant to be a good ice-breaker activity for the first day, but also illustrated, with hersey’s kisses, how quickly we eat up our resources when everyone is “responsible” for them and no one is in charge of monitorring the candy. The boys made connections to the Student Center and litter/graffiti in the city.

Last week I had them read and respond to a couple of different case studies, one on Easter Island and the other on the Puget Sound. It was good to see their ideas in writing and I could quickly figure out who will need to work a bit harder to keep up. The first unit in E.S. is simply sustainability and current environmental issues. I also go over the scientific method and stress that this is indeed a science course and not just an opportunity to volunteer viewpoints about nature. There is plenty of room for that, but they now understand that their opinions should be founded on scientific data. I have also noticed they want me to tell them how to think about certain environmental issues, such as organic or genetically modified foods. I stressed that hopefully, if all goes well, this course will teach them how to make those decisions for themselves.

This week we began the Energy, Systems and Ecology unit. They seemed to really enjoy it as we jumped into photosynthesis, thermodynamics, food webs and trophic levels. Tomorrow we will wrap up that lecture with energy pyramids and net/gross primary productivity. I am showing them a Planet Earth video tomorrow called “Into the Wilderness” in the second half of our double period. It is a great film because it ties in our work on ecosystems with our discussion of sustainbility last week.

I’ve decided the assign the boys reading and homework questions at the beginning of each week and every Friday I will collect it and quiz them. I have class last period on Fridays so hopefully a quiz will keep them focused. They have their first test next week on the first two units.

I am also posting just about everything (powerpoints to vocab lists to case studies) up on Collegiate Connect. That seems to be helping them a great deal. Some print out the powerpoints ahead of time, the notes format, and just jot things down as we go over the topics in class. I think it will help when I plan out my class next year since I will have everything in one place. We’ll see.