Investigation Sequence

Title

Ecosystems

Written by:

Robert D. Sweetland                 Date 1974, 2004

Focus Questions

What are environmental factors?
What is a community?
What is an ecosystem?
How are they related and not related?

Concepts

Content: Earth, Physical, & Life

Vocabulary

Community, organism, environmental factors, plants, decomposers, producers, mold, algae, yeaast, bacteria, virus, oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, heat, light, gravity, water, plant consumers, animal consumers, water cycle, pollutant, pollution, ecosystem, aquarium, terrarium, population, food chaiin, food web, biome, control, fertilizer, nutrients, circle of life.

Cross cutting concepts

Ecosystems and constancy, measurement, and change...
Ecosystems in evolution and equilibrium...
Models ...

Science Practice

Experiments need controls to ...

Personal, Social, Technology, Nature of Science, History

Water cycle for life...
Humans change ecosystems...
Pollution...
Pollutants...

Background information

 

Activity Sequence

Exploration Activity

Invention Activities

Design an ecosystem and maintain it.
Describe all organisms and popluations in an ecosystem.
Mold as a decomposer
Invent ecosystem model
Where watter comes from experiment
Moisture in the air
Invent the need for clean water and the water cycle model
Freon
Review water cycle and add to ecosystem model
Human breath, BTB, carbon dioxide experiment
Carbon dioxide hunt
Review BTB as an indicator
Snails and BTB
Water plants and BTB
Fish and carbon dioxide
Invent the carbon dioxide and oxygen cycle
Decomposers and carbon dioxide
Fertilizer andplant gowth
Tracking fertilizer
Invent pollutant and pollution and add to ecosystem model

Expansion Activity

Activity Descriptions

 

Dr. Robert Sweetland's notes