Bird Sleuth Wikipage

We started work on our Bird Sleuth projects today by entering information onto the CFS-Birds 2013 wikispace (http://cfsbirds-2013.wikispaces.com/HOME).  Each student has a page on the wiki where they will document the progress on their bird studies. Each student will ask a question about bird behavior and then set up an experiment, a descriptive study, or a data exploration to answer that question. These projects might include looking at which birds will be attracted to feeders that are placed in different locations around a yard, or seeing if the presence of a potential threat affects feeding patterns, or how environmental changes over time may be affecting bird migration patterns. The pages will be continually updated until they are finished in November when each student will give an oral presentation the class. This week we will be narrowing down the questions that we will be investigating.

Rotting Logs - Biodegradation

We went outside today to investigate rotting logs and to try to identify the different species involved in decomposition. We mapped out the members of the ecosystem of the rotting log. We identified different types of ants, spiders, millipedes, centipedes, sowbugs, slugs, snails, toads, salamanders, fungi, beetle larvae, and termites. We connected this back to our study of ecosystems and the important role decomposers have in returning nutrients to the soil.

Energy and Matter in Food Webs/Ecosystems

We have been looking at how energy flows through an ecosystem while matter is recycled. We have drawn and labeled models of different ecosystems and emphasized how energy is used up eventually, while matter is continually recycled.
Read pp 9-12 in Decay and Renewal, Due 9-17 Tuesday.

New School Year - Ecology

We are off to a good start this year. We will be studying Ecology during the first trimester. We have been outside getting to know our local ecosystem. We have begun constructing model food webs and have been developing our science vocabulary to help understand what keeps things going in the natural world.
We have had a small amount of homework, reading from "Decay and Renewal" the small textbook of sorts that we will be using as a reference this fall. We have been looking at photosynthesis and respiration, food webs and how energy flows through an ecosystem while matter cycles through.
We played a card game that simulates the structure of food webs and the interdependence of different types of organisms and their various roles, or niches, in a temperate forest ecosystem. After playing the game, students modified the game to make it more realistic and detailed.
The reading due on Thursday, September 5 was to read pages 3-5.
The reading due on Tuesday, September 10 is to read pages 6-9, stopping half way down page 9 where the new section "Classification of Living Things" begins.