(http://esseacourses.strategies.org)

Crops Investigation #10

Goal:

Students will become familiar with the carbon and nitrogen cycles.

Objectives:

Students will be able to:

Standards Met:

Overview:

Students will use the resources to assemble their own graphic representations of the carbon and nitrogen cycles.
 

Materials:

Resources:

Actions:

Prior to the lesson:

  1. Students have completed Cycle B.
  2. The class has generated a list of locally grown crops. These will be candidates for use on the new farmland. It is preferable that there be same number of plants as students. This will ensure that every student has a plant to research and that all plants are covered.

During the lesson:

  1. Have a discussion with the class about the change in scope that is going to take place today. In the previous lessons, the focus has been on plants as individual organisms. Now we are moving to a wider focus; to plants as being just one part of an ecosystem. Review the concept of an ecosystem (all of the living things, and their non-living environment, that interact in a given location).  There might also be a review of the ecological levels (individual, population, community, etc.).
  2. Plants interact with each other and with other organisms (bacteria, fungi, and animals). They take chemicals from the atmosphere and soil and they put chemicals back into the atmosphere and soil. Depending on the amount of time that you want to spend with discussion, you can have the class develop a list of the organisms that interact with plants and/or a list of the chemicals mentioned above.
  3. Review the concept that, in an ecosystem, nutrients cycle. There is movement of carbon, for example, from one organism to another (within the biotic component of the ecosystem) and from the organisms to the environment (from the biotic to the abiotic component) and back again.
  4. Students should use the resources to make their own representations of the carbon cycle and the nitrogen cycle. They will do this by cutting out the terms on the handouts and arranging the terms on a large sheet of paper. It is suggested that the students wait to affix the terms to the paper until the instructor has checked the arrangement of the terms for accuracy. Once the terms are affixed, drawings should be made around the terms to supplement the terms in building the cycle. Arrows should also be drawn to represent the flow of the nutrients throughout the cycle.
  5. At some point during the class period, it should be made clear to the students that different organisms can contribute differently to these cycles. For example, some plants can be used to contribute nitrogen to the soil, while most plants cannot; they only remove nitrogen from the soil. As another example, some plants require richer soil (more full of nutrients) than other plants.
  6. For homework, each student will be responsible for researching one crop that is grown in the area. Remember that the goal of this module is for the students to make recommendations for new crops and farming practices. Crops that are already grown locally would be good candidates. There should already to a list of local crops that was generated in Investigation 4. Every student is assigned (or chooses) a crop. They must complete the worksheet to provide a list of nutrients that the plant needs to grow well and they must determine the plant's preferred soil type. An internet search using the keywords: “growing YourPlantNameHere soil” should provide websites with the appropriate information.
  7. When the worksheets are complete, they should be posted around the room because they will be needed as students do research for their group presentations (Investigations 12 and 13).

Extensions:

  1. The cycles can be posted around the room or shared in some other way with the class.

Assessment:

Students assemble two graphic organizers during the class period and they complete a worksheet for homework.

Reflection:

Please write a reflection after you teach this lesson to help us make improvements. Reflections should be e-mailed to j.okeefe@moreheadstate.edu and c.wymer@moreheadstate.edu. If you also complete student reflections, please include these as well.