April showers bring May flowers right? Well how exactly do we measure such a thing? This article describes this processes. But why do we care? Right now throughout Oregon many cities are experiencing a drought while others are not. For cities that are, how much rain do you normally get this time of year? How many inches of rain would you need to catch up? For those that are not experiencing a drought, how much rain are you experiencing? These are great questions to ask your students.
Food shortage is not the only issue anymore. Wasting food is having a dramatic effect on the environment, economy and society. An estimated $162 billion is being lost because of unused food, as seen in this New York Times article. This is an interesting topic to pose to your students. What solutions can you come up with to solve the food waste problem in your club, school, community, state, country or world? How does this solution work? Share with us!
At the 2015 Winter Teacher’s Workshop, elementary teachers continued to focus on ecology. Teachers were fortunate to work with researcher and professor in the department of integrative biology, Mark Novak. A seven lesson unit focused around streams and macroinvertebrates was shared during this session. Novak provided an overview presentation that can help with understanding the concepts included in these lessons.
Build-a-Bug allows students work in pairs to create macroinvertebrates with adaptations that would allow them to survive in a habitat. This supplemental PowerPoint gives students the necessary background information for this lesson plan.
Home, Home, in a Stream is an activity in which students create mock streams containing the same habitats that they built their bugs for.
In the activity Macro Feeding Frenzie (along with this PowerPoint) students use various tools to collect a variety of ‘food’, which models the different feeding styles and the accompanying adaptations.
Macro Mayhem allows students to play an exciting game to help them understand how pollution impacts the biodiversity of macroinvertebrates found in a stream ecosystem.
In Biodiversity in a Leaf Pack, students create micro-habitats that will attract macroinvertebrates and place them local streams to collect organisms.
With the activity Analyzing a Leaf Pack, students collect leaf packs and analyze their findings.
Hungry, Hungry Macros allows students to use the macros collected from leaf packs and perform an experiment to determine whether shredders or grazers will eat more leaf material.
During the Winter Teacher’s Workshop, SMILE Elementary Club teachers were introduced to lessons and content around the topics of coral reefs and ocean acidification.
In the first lesson on coral reefs, Coral Reef Diversity, students are introduced to coral reef ecosystems, the importance of coral, and adaptations coral has made to live in a unique habitat. In the second, Coral Skeletons, students learn how coral shells are formed and the impact of climate change has had on coral reef ecosystems worldwide. In the final lesson, Thermal Expansion, students learn about how warming waters affect the ocean ecosystem.
This presentation on coral reefs was shared by PhD Student Katherine Dziedzic from the Department of Integrative Biology.
In the first lesson on ocean acidification, Whale Jenga, students learn about how changes in the food web might impact the ocean ecosystem. In the second, Lego Shell Building, students are to explore how ocean acidification may make it harder for corals to grow shells. In the third lesson, Marine Osteoporosis, students learn about the effects of acidic oceans on certain marine organisms and the causes of ocean acidification. In the fourth lesson, Ocean Acidification Car Activity, students find out how the burning of fossil fuels in automobiles can introduce CO2 to seawater causing acidification. In the final lesson, Ocean Acidification Demo the students observe first hand CO2 being absorbed into water.
The following presentations on ocean acidification were shared by the Olympic Coast Marine Sanctuary as part of the workshop ocean acidification:
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 Bioenergy activities for middle and high school that 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.) Please also note that the Fuel Comparison and Generations of Biofuels activities are the same, as both were presented to be used for both middle and high school levels. 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!
Middle School Activities
The following activities are meant for use in SMILE clubs or classrooms at the middle school level. Each activity includes a comprehensive lesson plan with background information, materials, procedures, and challenge questions for your students. From these activities, we hope your students gain a better understanding of bioenergy and renewable resources, in particular renewable fuels or biofuels. Upon completion of these activities, middle school students should understand that bioenergy technology must be desirable, convenient, and accessible. They should be able to articulate the need for further technology development to challenge traditional energy standards. Through these activities students will also explore benefits to the environment and humans from bioenergy technology and understand that bioenergy pioneering efforts come from unexpected places. These activities will provide interesting, engaging opportunities for your students to learn and grow their understanding of bioenergy.
- Fuel Comparison: Students will be able to understand the positive and negative effects of using fossil fuels and biofuels, why fossil fuels are so prevalent, what are some alternatives to fossil fuels, and what can be done to push these alternatives into market. They will also learn where the energy they use comes from and what kind of energy sources Oregon uses to produce energy.
- Generations of Biofuels: Students will learn about the three generations of biofuels, how they are produced, their advantages and disadvantages, and the marketability of each fuel through this discussion-based activity.
- Polymer Activity: Students will learn about the use of polysaccharide sugars in the biofuel production process. They will take monomers found in glue and use borax to create a polymer.
- Roots and Shoots: Students will design an experiment to measure plant growth rates in the field to gather data to help determine the best crop choice for biofuel production and to explore carbon sequestration.
- Soil Investigations: Students will examine three different soil samples and determine the effects of air space on the soil.
High School Activities
The following activities are meant for use in SMILE clubs at the high school level. Each activity includes a comprehensive lesson plan with background information, materials, procedures, and challenge questions for your students. From these activities, we hope your students gain a better understanding of bioenergy and renewable resources, in particular renewable fuels or biofuels. Upon completion of these activities, high school students should understand that bioenergy technology must be desirable, convenient, and accessible. They should be able to articulate the need for further technology development to challenge traditional energy standards. They will also explore benefits to the environment and humans from bioenergy technology and understand that bioenergy pioneering efforts come from unexpected places. These activities will provide interesting, engaging opportunities for your students to learn and grow their understanding of bioenergy.
- Fuel Comparison: Students will be able to understand the positive and negative effects of using fossil fuels and biofuels, why fossil fuels are so prevalent, what are some alternatives to fossil fuels, and what can be done to push these alternatives into market. They will also learn where the energy they use comes from and what kind of energy sources Oregon uses to produce energy.
- Generations of Biofuels: Students will learn about the three generations of biofuels, how they are produced, their advantages and disadvantages, and the marketability of each fuel through this discussion-based activity.
- Carbon Footprint Activity: Students will gain an understanding of the effect of their lifestyle choices on their carbon footprint. It will also help them recognize the lifestyle choices available to them that would lower their carbon footprint. Additionally, students will also be asked to critically think whether the available options for lowering their carbon footprint are actions that they are willing to take.
- Microbial Fuel Cells (MFCs): There are two activities for MFCs — Bacteria Power: Students will explore the phenomenon of electrical production from bacteria by creating a mud bacteria fuel cell and testing the voltages at different time intervals. Battery vs. Fuel Cell – What’s the Difference?: Students will learn what a battery is, how different materials used in the battery influence the effectiveness of the battery, and how to make a battery out of household items.
- Enzymes and Bioenergy: Students will explore enzymes and their use in creation of lignocellulosic biofuels. They will also examine economical and time considerations in new energy efficiency technologies.
- Growing Bioenergy: Students will get the opportunity to plant a poplar tree and discuss the uses and growth of poplar trees for bioenergy technologies.
