In an attempt to understand photosynthesis with more accuracy we modeled the process today with blocks! I do hope this gave you a clearer understanding of the steps in the process. I was very proud of a bunch of you who have your science fair projects all completed and turned in...well done!!!!!!!!! 
   Today we read a section i the life Science book explaining photosynthesis in more detail. I feel there is still confusion over the process so tomorrow we will look at a model of photosynthesis to get the process clearer in your minds.
Where does most of the matter come from that makes up the wood and leaves of a tree? This is the question we are looking at to find the answer to through our plant investigation and our field study. Our initial poll suggests that just 4 peole in the 7th grade know the correct answer to this question. Ask your parents and see what they think! Today we went to the Pond Ecosystem to specifically observe the plant that the leaf came from that you drew yesterday.
     What a great day at the Frog Pond Ecosystem! Each group saw something different. Period 1 watched as 2 hawks circled overhead. Period 3 Walked the boundary and spotted clumps of fur. Period 4 saw frogs!! see their sketches below. Back in class we spent the rest of the class period making a detailed observational drawing of a plant sample.  
Firstly I am sorry that there have been no posts since last Tuesday. First I have had technical issues and secondly i was sick thursday and Friday. rest assured that you have not missed any assignment turn ins! So what have we been doing? Well you all did a great job on the quiz!!! We have been practicing the words so much that it showed in the scores WELL DONE!!!! Secondly we have started an investigation to test some of your ideas about what plants need to make food. I wonder if any of you noticed how I keep saying MAKE FOOD!!!!! So the seeds are planted and we now need to make observations every other day. Over the next few days you are going to be learning to make detailed observations and drawings of producers. detailed observations allows scientist and naturalists to identify individual species. We are going to practice this on the most common species of plants in our ecosystem.
I can discuss the role of producers in the ecosystem. We started by l;ooking a the producers in a local ecosystem, defining what they are and finding ways of identifying a producer seperate from the consumers. From here we looked at the Everglades Ecosystem. Thanks Sarah for great photos of that ecosystem, it really brought it alive to us all! Make sure you have the Everglades food web in your journals.  This is a picture of the Middle Fork Snoqualmie River taken from North bend way. What are the producers? How can we recognize they are producers?
Today in the computer lab we used the FOSS website to creat food webs in different ecosystems. www.fossweb.com
I can create layered food webs.. In journals you drew the food web for the great Plains. During this process you realised that you needed to make some inferences about the organisms in order to complete the food web. once this was done you then had to make a good copy of the food web and turn it in. you could choose the Mono lake ecosystem or the Great Plains ecosystem.  Here is Stefan's interpretation of the Great Plains Ecosystem. I really like how he illustrated this food web.
Taking inspiration from one of the groups from yesterday we talked about layered food webs. Mary puts it really well when she says " the layered food webs with the arrows shows the enregy transfers in the ecosystem". The diagram is one big energy transfer! Another student noticed that the layered food web in the flip chart (open the pdf below) looks like a person. the feet of the person
Yesterday you watched a Planet Earth about the Great Plains. Please keep that information that you wrote safely in your journal. Today we focused on the many feeding relationships in the Mono Lake Ecosystem and discussed the bast way to show those relationships as a model. connor very nicely summed up that we were showing how energy is transfered from one organism to the next. Below is an image of complex feeding relationships . This is a food web.  | Announcements
I am starting to use this website as a resource. I will not use it as the daily lesson updates but simply as a resource. Mrs FrearsonI teach 7th grade science and reading. ArchivesOctober 2013 | ||||||||||||||||||
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