Conservation organizations teamed up to document the climate vulnerability of mountain springs that support unique ecosystems. Now, the Alliance they formed facilitates restoration work to enhance habitats and improve resiliency.
This online article, from the museum's Musings newsletter for educators, profiles two scientists who lead walking tours in New York City's green spaces. Bill Schiller, a botany lecturer and senior museum instructor, discusses the ways in which he "builds an appreciation of how nature works and a sense of responsible stewardship" during his tours. Bob DeCandido, an urban park ranger, explains how he "teaches city-dwellers to look closely at their wild neighbors and become better environmental stewards in the process." The article also includes ideas for four activities that can be completed during a walking tour.
Botany generally refers to the study of plants, but other organisms are often included in the field such as photosynthetic bacteria, fungi, algae, and slime molds. Plants are multicellular organisms with complex, eukaryotic cells that contain cell walls, chloroplasts, and other cell structures that are absent in animal cells. They can be studied at many levels, ranging from the molecules that comprise them to cells and tissues to organs (flowers, leaves, roots, etc.) to organ systems (shoot system and roots systems). Each structure in the plant body is adapted to optimize its function, whether it be photosynthesis, support, nutrient absorption, transportation, or reproduction. Plant physiology explores the chemistry and physics of these functions, including how they respond to the environment, coordinate responses using hormones, gather energy and nutrients, and change throughout their life cycles. Plant ecology examines even larger scales, including plant populations and their roles in communities and ecosystems. Humans rely on plants for food, fiber, and medicines, and to provide clean air, erosion control, and other services. Unfortunately, human activities resulting in habitat loss, climate change, and pollution threaten plant biodiversity, but current and future conservation efforts slow the loss of biodiversity.
In The Botany of Desire, Michael Pollan explores risks inherent in one of the most widespread practices in modern agriculture. It's called monoculture, and it refers to cultivation of single or very similar varieties of a food crop on large acreages. In many cases, the variety is one that dominates the marketplace, like the Russet Burbank potato, whose shape makes it a favorite for cutting French fries, or one of the few apple varieties commonly seen in supermarkets. Monoculture may offer economic advantages, but Pollan argues that it brings serious environmental risks.
Building on lessons learned over several summers, Kristin Raab—Health Impact Assessment and Climate Change Program Director in the Environmental Health Division of Minnesota’s Department of Health—packaged information from diverse communities into a cohesive toolkit that communities of all sizes can use to prepare for heat waves. The Minnesota Extreme Heat Toolkit describes changing weather conditions in Minnesota, the magnitude of potential health consequences from extreme heat, and key steps communities can take to prevent heat-related illnesses and deaths. The toolkit acknowledges that extreme heat response plans will vary with the size of the community and the habits of its residents: examples from the mostly rural Olmsted County and the urban centers of Saint Paul and Minneapolis illustrate a range of community plans that could be useful in Minnesota and beyond.
This course provides an outline of vertebrate functional neuroanatomy, aided by studies of comparative neuroanatomy and evolution, and by studies of brain development. Topics include early steps to a central nervous system, basic patterns of brain and spinal cord connections, regional development and differentiation, regeneration, motor and sensory pathways and structures, systems underlying motivations, innate action patterns, formation of habits, and various cognitive functions. In addition, lab techniques are reviewed and students perform brain dissections.
Utopia or dystopia? It’s up to us.
In the 21st century, powerful technologies have been appearing at a breathtaking pace—related to the internet, artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, and more. They have amazing potential upsides, but we can’t ignore the serious risks that come with them.
Brave New Planet is a podcast that delves deep into the most exciting and challenging scientific frontiers, helping us understand them and grapple with their implications. Dr. Eric Lander, president and founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, is a geneticist, molecular biologist, and mathematician who was a leader of the Human Genome Project and for eight years served as a science advisor to the White House for President Obama. He’s also the host of Brave New Planet, and he’s talked to leading researchers, journalists, doctors, policy makers, activists, and legal experts to illuminate how this generation’s choices will shape the future as never before.
Brave New Planet is a partnership between the Broad Institute, Pushkin Industries, and the Boston Globe.
Breathing Easier is a 5th-grade curricular program created by EarthGen. For this unit, we offer professional development training and assistance with implementation. If you are interested in implementing this program at your school or district, please let us know! Please contact info@earthgenwa.org for more information.EarthGen and Puget Sound Clean Air Agency have partnered to develop opportunities for learning about local air quality (AQ). Using interactive maps, multimedia resources, classroom discussions, community science, and data analysis, students will explore the causes of air pollution and its relationship to environmental justice. These lessons are aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards and encourage students to engage in argumentation from evidence and propose solutions to socio-ecological issues of air quality and public health for communities in Washington.
This collection of activities is based on a weekly series of space science problems distributed to thousands of teachers during the 2009-2010 school year. They were intended for students looking for additional challenges in the math and physical science curriculum in grades 9 through 12. The problems were created to be authentic glimpses of modern science and engineering issues, often involving actual research data. The problems were designed to be one-pagers with a Teachers Guide and Answer Key as a second page. This compact form was deemed very popular by participating teachers.
This classroom lab is a guided practice for inquiry using brine shrimp as the subject to be investigated.
BRIGHT Girls was a project to build broader participation in the sciences, led by the University of Alaska Fairbanks and funded by the National Science Foundation. We sought to increase students' motivation and capacity to pursue careers in STEM by engaging them in studies of nearby natural environments. The developed lesson plans may be used in formal or informal educational settings, e.g., in a summer academy or across multiple class periods. These investigations help students explore the relationships among life history and ecosystems, connecting biology to geology and remote sensing.
To manage their businesses successfully, farmers and food production companies need to know what crops are in the ground and how well they are growing. A pair of easy-to-use online mapping tools provides this information for growing seasons in the past and present.
A new instructional model, called Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI), is introduced to elementary teachers in this article. The author shows how school librarians and classroom teachers can collaborate to help students construct and communicate evidence, or arguments. Evidence buckets, a collaborative activity, and related online resources are presented. The article appears in the free online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which is structured around the seven essential principles of climate literacy.
The purpose of this resource is to observe budburst on selected trees at a Land Cover or Phenology Site. All students will learn about hummingbird natural history and ecology. Students will learn how to identify and age male and female Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and to observe migration and feeding behavior. Students will learn how to make connections among hummingbird behavior and weather, climate, food availability, seasonality, photoperiod (day length), and other environmental factors.
This activity is a field investigation where students gather data on physical characteristics of the ecosystem surrounding their school.
This activity is a field investigation where students gather data on physical changes of the ecosystem surrounding their school habitat.
This unit will teach students about “Carbon and Ecosystems.” They will begin by analyzing the four spheres: biosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, geosphere and how they are interconnected. They will understand that one system cannot exist without the other in order to maintain proper functioning within our planet. The students will learn about the various types of ecosystems that exist and how living organisms depend on other living and non-living organisms for survival. This being said, students will examine how the spheres interact and how changes in one, affects another. Students will understand that ecosystems are fueled by the energy from the sun and cycles from which they are powered.
It will focus on what the carbon cycle is and its’ influence in our lives. Carbon is essential for all life on Earth and is also in our atmosphere. It regulates the Earth’s temperature and provides an essential source of the energy to fuel our economy. The carbon cycle describes how carbon moves throughout the Earth’s spheres. By gaining a deeper understanding of how carbon moves, we can better regulate our daily decisions to help sustain our future.
In this activity, students conduct a short hands-on demonstration that simulates ocean acidification resulting from excess atmospheric carbon dioxide and discuss potential implications of increases in ocean temperatures and acidification due to climate change.
Students will utilize previously gained knowledge about the impact of land management practices on ecosystems to design, conduct and analyze an experiment to measure biodiversity and/or invertebrate ecosystem role in a field community. They will identify ecosystems that have been heavily and lightly impacted by human activities and make predictions about biodiversity in the area. They will then test and analyze the information gathered and apply what this means about the biodiversity in these ecosystems and the implications this may have on the region.
This activity is a biology lab investigation where students create habitats to observe decomposers in a controlled setting.