Blogging:
For the rest of the week, please pick out an activity/topic from each day and discuss why you found it particularly interesting/valuable to do/learn about. Also, give feedback as you wish on the day's theme(s) with questions/comments/etc. We may also add questions/or not. Respond to this assignment in the "comments" below:
59 comments:
I enjoyed the Acidity Lab, because this would be a lab that I can do for my classroom. Working the Excel program will be the hardest part for me . I would have to continue to work in this area so I could incorporate it into my classroom smoothly.
The experiment to determine the mathematical relationship between intensity and the distance from a light source was interesting. The Light Sensor equipment and the Logger Pro equipment from the Vernier Corporation were very useful. This experiment, like the others, emphasized the theme of our workshop, which is, integrating math into our science instruction. It was fun to observe the decrease in the measurements of intensity as the distance between the light sensor and the light source changed. The use of excel to plot logarithmic values of experimental results is one area I will help my students to become proficient in.
I actually liked the light lab best on Tuesday. I thought the Excel graphing could be good, I especially liked my ability go graph lots of data quickly by completing one run and modifying the table on subsequent sheets.
I liked the enzyme lab since it was more hands on. I could actually see changes in the samples. I don't have issues with the math but the science concepts are difficult for me.
i liked the light intensity lab that we did yesterday. I really like to make graphs in excel. It was helpful to see how to make the titles this morning. Thanks,
this is a test
Testing
I am no longer a stranger
Wednesday: The curcuit lab is something I can do in class. I am struggling with the math side of things. The numbers and terms overwhelm me.
Reaction for Tuesday
I liked how we use the Laws of logarithms to determine the exponent of the graph. This keeps the students from just guessing. Any exponent can be found in this manner. The acidity lab was a little more frusterating. Any lab that ends in someone telling me that it should have done "this or that" makes me wonder.
Reaction for Wed.
I liked working with the circuits. The light bulbs are a good, cheap idea! I don't have the access to the equiptment for the other lab, so I doubt I will use it.
Tuesday--My comment from yesterday was similiar to what people talked about this morning--how I feel with the unfamiliar chemistry concepts and how my students feel about new math concepts as I am teaching them.
Wednesday--Our discussion this morning about how we assess whether our students have learned a concept got me thinking about different ways that I currently assess and other ways I could use. Several of the methods that were mentioned I use without realizing such as questioning and student writing. I am interested to hear more about calculus in chemistry!
Reaction for Tuesday:
Even though I teach 8th grade Math and won't do the Light lab that we did in class I know our Science teacher does work quite a bit with light. I hope that we can work together and integrate a lab similar to this. My thought is that our Science teacher can run the lab and I can work with the students on putting the data into graphs using excel and then we can do some data analysis. So, this is a lab I can see us using with our students.
Reaction for Wednesday:
I liked doing the lab with the circuits. It was something that actually made sense to me! I think this is an activity that I could incorporate into my math class cooperatively with the Science teacher.
Reaction of Wednesday Class
I liked doing the labs today, but I will have trouble fitting them into my classes. I don't teach Physics or Physical Science, so I'm planning to share the circuit lab with those teachers. For the kinetics lab, I don't have the equipment (I believe! I am going to my class this weekend to check any nooks and crannies for a Venier) to do this lab. I'm getting more comfortable with doing the Excel program though. (Yeah!!) To much facebook :)
I will now be able to do the light experiment better in my classroom, as i will take into account the ambient light in the room, and will be able to adjust to it! i will also have the students use the confidence formula for the slope.
Wednesday
when doing the circuit experiment in class, i will use the christmas lights but enough battery strength to make sure the all the lights in the circuit light, as we found out today that 2 D batteries was not strong enough to light the lights that were in parallel. i am also getting more confident in graphing on excel, and will have students use the graphing in class. i will first ask if they've learned HOW to graph on excel in another class.
I liked both activities today. I could see more of the math in the kinetic lab, so it made sense to me. In the circuit lab I understood a problem we were having with lighting at home.
I like the circuit experiment. I don't know much about it but I felt I learned something. I loved the idea of cutting up the Christmas tree lights.I think I could do that.
Reaction to Tuesday:
This comment is in response to something we have used all three days and will probably continue to use all week, and that is the use of Excel. I had no idea that Excel would do the things a graphing calculator would do. I like it because the students can have their calculations, data, and visuals all in one spot. Mathematics in Excel is something I will use in my math class.
Reaction to Wednesday:
I did enjoy the circuit lab we did today. I think I liked it because it was a little easier for me to understand than the other activities. I also liked the task of actually building the circuits.
Science was never my strong point, and I continue to struggle with it in this class. However, I am enjoying seeing how math is used in science experiments.
Response to Tuesday
I enjoyed the "Light, Brightness, and Distance" lab. It seemed logical that the intensity of the light would decrease as the distance from the light source increased. However, to actually collect the data and then create a table and graph it in Excel provided a valuable means for evaluating the data. The "Enzymes" lab was also interesting. By exploring a variety of factors that may vary enzymatic reaction, students would not become focused on just one means (something my students often do) as the sole determinant.
Response to Wednesday
I am feeling much more comortable with the science concepts and procedures involved in our activities (whoever would have thought that circuits would start making sense to me! ;-o). The innate mathematical "tie-ins" can easily be reinforced. At our middle school we are fortunate to have team meeting time in which we can work toward integrating these concepts across the curricular areas.
I enjoyed the experiment to determine the change in absorbance with time, the procedure was easy to understand. It was fun to observe the fading color of the sample as the reaction continued.
I liked the crystal violet hydrolysis lab. Our school does not havwe a spectrograph so I couldn't do this in my class, but it is always fun to use equipment you don't get to on a regular basis. I know I will be using Excell in my classes for lab analysis and reports.
The assessment discussion this morning got me thinking about how I access and what I can do to change that. I am not good at English so I have problems with wording questions both oral and written.
From Monday and Tuesday
The electricity, density, brightness can all be used in my classes. I have found that the leadership of the instructors showing us how to integrate and assess the students has been just as helpfuf as the work we are doing.
i believe i am FINALLY able to post where i'm SUPPOSED to post!!! about time, eh??? it's only thursday!!!
I liked the electricity and circuit lab. I liked the recycling of Christmas lights that might not work anymore. I also have the equipment at my school to do this lab. This is also the first time for me to post in the right place.
Wednesday thoughts:
Today was enjoyable. I appreciate the attempt to show how we could make the electrical circuits work on a budget, but was disappointed that we didn't have the results that would have been expected.
I loved the Spectrophotometer lab, but my excitement is quickly tempered when I realize my district will never spring for even the economy versions of equipment so I could do it with my kids.
The radioactive decay lab worked well and gave good results! I am thinking that even without the equipment we used today, we could do a simulation of half-life with our students and be able to use Excel to analyze the results.
I am a little lost with the analysis of the enzyme lab. I may need help with that on Friday!
Reaction to Thursday: I was glad that we were able to go thru the light circuit answers today. I think I am actually starting to understand some of the activities, this one in particular. I also thought the alpha, beta gamma lab and half-life labs were interesting. I teach Math and so I enjoyed the opportunity to use some of the equipment we were able to use today as I don't usually get the chance to do that. When we did the alpha, beta, gamma lab and discovered that lead absorbs the most it was like a light bulb went off for me and it made sense. .. .lots of lightbulbs for me this week . .either literal or otherwise. :)
Thursday:
Since I am a math teacher with little science background, I was excited for today because we were going to focus a little more on math. Although I tried to follow the math, it was still tough because we were using science vocab that I am still not familiar with. Although I struggled following along, I think it was good for me as a teacher to experience that. Hopefully the experience will help me instruct a student who is going through the same experience in my classroom.
I feel a LITTLE more comfortable with the use of calculus as it is used in chemistry & physics, but i am a LOT more comfortable using the graphs to determine the values needed.
I was a little overwhelmed with the math section in this afternoon discussion. I did enjoy the discussion on content versus teaching to standards. The lab was interesting this morning but I don't have the equipment to do this lab. Had Chinese tonight it was great!!!!!!
I'm ok using excel to do the graphs and I understand the line of best fit and so on, but I did struggle with calculus material this afternoon, it's been too long since I did calculus. I also struggle with some of the science terminology.
Thursday reflection:
I really liked the radiation lab. I have always wanted a geiger counter to play with in the world and we ran out of time to do this lab in my undergraduate physics class. I also loved having the HUGE set of data to graph for our Polonium.
I really liked the calculus review, but I am super rusty. I want to take out my old textbook now, however.
My only issue is that sometimes I don't feel like I know exactly what to include in my lab reports.
I enjoyed the use of the geiger counter to measure radiation. During my undergraduate years, I took a 200 level physics course titled: Atomic and Nuclear Physics, we did not perform this experiment, I assumed the reason was that it would be too dangerous for us considering the "hazards of radiation", over two decades later, here I was, experiencing the use of the counter. It was interesting to observe in real life the effects of the different items that limited the amount of radiation emitted.
I liked the radiation lab. I know that I will not be able to acquire the lab materials and equiptment for it. Also, I liked the math section and the calculus talk.
quote of the day
"Science without math is just glorified stamp collecting!"
-Anon.
I enjoyed the radiation lab today. It was interesting to note the impact of each shield on the varying types of radiation. It made sense that distance, shielding, and time decreased th amount of radiation absorbed (amount depending on the type of radiation in some of the cases). However, to actually collect the data and chart/graph the results really brought it home and provided clear-cut evidence to support this.
Too often math and science tend to work in isolation whereas the "tie-ins" are both natural and could be easily incorporated.
I enjoyed the radioactivity activity. It was fun just to see it and understand a little of what it is and how something will block it.
Population Questions:
# 5. The higher the initial population of predators, the greater the rate of extinction of the prey.
# 6. 50/40 predator-prey ratio with a .25 attack rate and a 100% conversion efficiency. Mortality rate of 100% and a rate of increase of 100% leads to a stable system with no extinction.
5. The more preditors there are the faster the prey will go away.
6. With 50 preditors and 40 prey with a 25% attack rate and a 100% conversion efficiency you will have a system that doesn't die off.
I don't completely understand this one.
5. If you increase the initial number of predators, they will kill off the prey at a greater rate. This will cause the prey population to decrease more rapidly.
6. If you use and Attack rate of .25, a conv. eff. of 1 and a mortality rate of 1 and an upper limit of 20, you get a system that does not die off.
Response for Thursday:
The radioactivity lab was enjoyable. This would be a good way to introduce or extend the concept of half-life. The review of the calculus was great. The connection between the equations in the chemical kinetics and radioactivity and the slope-intercept form of a line was interesting.
In the "doomed" groups are the ones that are inefficient hunters and if the numbers of the predators are decreased then the will really be in trouble.
Ideally you would want a highly efficient predator and a highly productive prey.
Friday comment: Both labs are something that I can use in my middle school math class. I can adapt them to fit what I need for my students, especially the "Finding Nemo" activity. We use that (or I should say similar to that) at Memorial to teach how to add and subtract integers. I enjoyed both activities today. They will be the most useful to me.
Friday questions for Predator/Prey lab:
5. When we decreased the number of predators to 10, they were extinct by the end of the second generation. In general, it would cause the predator graph to approach or reach 0.
6. Another viable combination that gave a cyclic pattern had the following parameters:
Initial Predator 5 Prey 4
a (attack ratio) 0.25 1
f (conversion efficiency) 1
m (mortality) 1
Duration 45
Upper limit 20
I would really like to do the predator/prey lab with my environmental science students. I would have to research how to figure out how to do the various rates. I liked how each group had different situations to work out, but I think the ineffiecent predator would be a reach.
Both labs today were interesting and easily applicable to middle school. I know that the predator-prey lab makes some assumptions that aren't necessarily valid, but it can serve as a valuable way to involve students in a process to stimulate discussion and exploration.
To all the instructors, assistants, and fellow participants - thank you for a wonderful week. I enjoyed meeting each of you. Take care and have a fantastic school year!
#5 Dropping predators down should cause them dropped to almost extinction or cause them to go extinct. In our case we went 3 generations in the first case and the mortality rate of 90% while it went down 20% in sthe second case scencario, but we only went two generations
#6 Group 4 which had a efficient predator and a highly reproductive prey should cause a stable environment. I am thinking coyotes and rabbits. Coyotes hunt in packs which is efficient and rabbits are highly reproductive
Brian
Friday's lab [preditor/prey]
question #5: by changing the preditors from 40 to 10, while keeping the prey at 50, the ratio of preditor to prey in generations 2 and 3 increased to 4:1,from less than 2:1.
question #6: i was able to maintain a population of preditor and prey that fluctuated within a small range by decreasing the efficiency of the preditor's kill rate down to about 5%.
i will be using the "finding nemo" lab in my physic's class this year, and will be curious to see if any groups do vector addition to find their final location. i will also show how to add more than two vectors.
#5. Changing the predator population would have a direct impact on the prey population. Increasing the predator population would result in a larger, quicker extinction rate for the prey. Conversely, decreasing the predator population would result in a skyrocketing prey population, leading to near extinction by the end of the second generation.
#6. Starting with a ratio of 43:47 predator:prey would result in a stable population using a .25 attack rate with a 100% conversion efficiency, mortality rate of 100%, and a rate of inc. of 100%
Johnny
Answers to Predator/Prey model
5. Doomed groups were inefficient species. They had a hard time hunting and reproducing. This caused them to die off. Because the predator was inefficient and died off, it allowed the prey to reproduce at a high level. This caused the prey population to sky rocket.
6. I had some trouble using the program to model the predator/prey model. I wasn't sure what exactly the numbers meant, how to work it, etc. However, based on all of the discussions we had in class, I can give you what I think a viable combination would be.
I think in order for both species to do well, there needs to be a good number of predator and prey with prey outnumbering the predator: 30/50. I would think in order for both of the species to survive, they would both need to reproduce efficiently. Also, I think to keep the predator alive and the prey population in check, the predator would need a fairly high success rate on hunting.
Comments from Friday:
I wanted to say that I really enjoyed the force activity we did in the afternoon. I have always enjoyed trigonometry, and it was fun to be able to use it.
Question 5. If you change the predator population it will have a direct impact on the prey population. If you increase the number of predators it will cause the prey population to eventually become extinct. If you decrease the predator population it will adversely impact the prey population. Their population will increase rapidly and will eventually become extinct as well.
#6. Starting with a ratio of 43:47 predator:prey would result in a stable population pf 25% attack rate with a 100% conversion efficiency, mortality rate of 100%and a rate of inc. of 100%.
Greg's Comments from Friday:
"Finding Nemo" is a great engage and exploration lab for vector addition. Dividing into teams by counting off after lining up from tallest to shortest was a unique way to form the groups.
Predator/Prey Model
5. Team 4-When decreasing the predators from 40 to 10, the total predators in the 2nd generation decreased by 27%(44 to 32) while the prey increased by 68%(76 to 128).
Predator/Prey Model
6. Starting with a predator to prey ratio of 20 to 80 results in a stable population if there is a 10% attack rate, 25% conversion efficiency, 200% mortality rate, 300% rate of increase, a duration of 20, and an upper limit of 150.
Predator Prey Model
This experiment gave me an insight into the variables at play in a real ecosystem. The instructor started by telling us a story about what happened in an Alaska ecosystem when some species without natural predators were introduced, the temporary paradise the species were experiencing later turned to a disaster. This led reseachers to conclude that it is foolhardy to circumvent the sequences of nature. Nature always tends to take its course in order to create a balance. In the past, I have wondered what type of hands on laboratory excersise I would use to demonstrate population growth patterns in an ecosystem. This workshop have given me the guide that I need.
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