First Weeks of School

• Tues 8/30:  2nd year overview and reminders of class rules.  Group work with ecology concepts and types of nutrition.  Hand out Safety and Academic Honesty contracts to be turned in by next Tuesday.  Read 4.1 in text for Thursday 9/1.
• Thurs 9/1:  Go over group work questions.  In your table groups, create an illustrated food web with at least 10 organisms in it.  It should make sense as much as possible and show the direction of the flow of energy.  You do not need to put decomposers in the diagram.  Start individual bookwork questions listed on this blog.  Try to get at least to #5.  We will have more time on Tuesday for that one.  Read 4.2 in text for Tues 9/6.
• Tues 9/6:  Signed Safety and Academic Honesty contracts are due.  Go over quadrat activity and have some work time to finish the individual assignment.  Mesocosms.  Watch the Ted Talk on Biosphere 2 and make your class mesocosm in a bottle.  Make initial observations.  Energy transformations and energy pyramids.  Do DBQ on p. 216 in your notebook.  Get the work for today checked off.  Read 4.3 for Thursday.
• Thurs 9/8:  Observe the mesocosms (you may observe yours and those of other classes).  Carbon cycling.  Go through the processes involved in the carbon cycle.  At your table group make an illustrated diagram of the carbon cycle.  Make sure that you label all "pools" and all "fluxes".  Assign 4.3 data-based questions to different groups.  Read the questions, discuss at your table, and decide on answers.  Each group will then explain their questions to the larger group of the class.