The SMILE Program @ OSU

Last teacher workshop we previewed awesome middle school and high school bioenergy textbooks from Facing the Future.  These books are filled with activities including Sustainable Flight in the Pacific Northwest, which is a great real life example.  In this activity students will research different biofuels and decide which one is best suited to be mixed with jet fuel. They will then trace the production process and explore stakeholder’s positions with their classmates. Collectively classmates must come up with a new jet fuel policy that satisfies all of their stakeholders. This activity encourages healthy debate and will allow students to act as policy makers. We will be handing out the Facing the Future textbooks during the teacher workshop and we encourage you to check out their other amazing activities.

We did not forget about our middle school students.  We wanted them to have a fun game as well and we made one with help from PBS SciGirls. This game was modified so that students could test their bioenergy knowledge. As the name suggests students will be quizzed on bioenergy based science, technology, engineering, and math questions. The questions are meant to get kids moving and using their creativity skills. Check it out!

Teachers, we have been dormant for a while so we could create amazing activities for you and your students.  The teacher workshop is just a few weeks away and we wanted to give you a preview of one of the great activities you can use in your classroom.  To start, we found this Bioenergy Farm Game from Great Lakes that would be perfect for a high school classroom.  Students will take the perspective of a bioenergy farmer to learn the benefits and drawbacks of crops, like corn and switchgrass, that can be turned into fuel. This game allows students to see where and how money is made and the effects of their actions on the environment. Check back for more activities that will be presented at the teacher workshop.  See you there!

Previously on the blog we showed you how to build a biodegradable battery from washers, pennies, and vinegar. A SMILE Club from Forest Grove High School shared with us the many different objects they used to try to create a battery.  Success came when the club used a strawberry as their energy source, but what characteristics of strawberry make it a good battery? We think this video does a great job of explaining the science behind this concept:

Hopefully after watching this video you have a better understanding of anodes and cathodes.  What else could be used in place of the strawberry or lemon? Scientist Angela Belcher is working on making batteries from viruses so that batteries can be biodegradable.  In this article she expands on her research.  What do you think will make a good battery?

The SMILE club at Forest Grove High School was nice enough to share with us their pictures of them planting their poplar samplings.  We encourage you to start planting soon and we look forward to exchanging data in the future.  Remember earlier in the term we shared with you a lesson plan as well as a video to help your students learn about bioenergy.  Happy planting!

GreenWood Resources, home to the largest drip irrigation farm in the world, was nice enough to provide our workshop attendees with several varieties of poplar saplings.  With these saplings we ask that you and your students plant them and conduct your own growth experiment.  Here we have provided for you a lesson plan as well as planting instructions for your trees.  We would like to see data about your sapling’s progress and we will provide a way to share that data in the near future. Enjoy!

At the SMILE Teacher’s Workshop we showcased a plethora of great lessons plans, one of which was presented by Danica Hendrickson from Facing The Future.  She was gracious enough to share with us a PowerPoint for high school students that focuses on how we use energy everyday and where that energy comes from. Danica also recommended checking out these websites in conjunction with her lesson plan to see how much waste and energy recycling saves us.  These are great bioenergy ideas to share with your students.

This post contains activities to be done at Family Math and Science Nights with your SMILE clubs. These activities were presented at our Summer Teacher’s Workshop earlier in August. The lesson plans and any other resources for each activity are available on Google Drive. To access the lesson plans, click on the title of each activity. (Note: you do NOT have to have a Google account to access these files.) You are able to download and/or print the files for all of the activities directly from Google Drive, but you must download the file before you can make any personal edits. Please let us know if you have any questions or feedback!

Family Math and Science Night (FMSN) activities are meant to be hands-on, engaging activities for students to do with their families. These particular activities reinforce the information learned in club meetings about Bioenergy, as well as provide a new learning experience for students and their families. Students also have the opportunity to share their knowledge and have a teaching moment with their families and peers. Each activity for FMSN can be easily adapted for use in a SMILE club meeting or to meet the specific needs of each SMILE club. Almost all of the materials are things that can be purchased at a grocery store, which makes these activities easy to prepare and set up for. We hope you and your students find these activities exciting and engaging!

• Biodegradable Plastic: Students learn what bioplastics are and what some of their many applications are. Students will create their own biodegradable plastic using corn-based ingredients.
  

• Bioenergy Research Posters: Students will research, plan, create, and present a poster about a renewable energy source, preferably a form of biofuel or bioenergy. They will have several club meetings to create the poster, then display and present it at FMSN. They will gain new knowledge about renewable energy and energy conservation, and have an opportunity to be creative and inventive as they learn.
  

• Ethanol Production Activity: Students will gain an understanding of how different energy sources may be used to produce ethanol fuel and other biofuels. Students will observe the fermentation process of different types of simple sugars present in common, consumable foodstuffs and use carbon dioxide accumulation to see how much ethanol is made with each type of sugar.