Deborah A. Johnson
Activity 1
- Nitrogen Cycle Game – Students would have previously been taught the composition of the atmosphere from the Weather Unit. Students will pretend they are a nitrogen atom. There will be stations set up throughout the classroom. Nitrogen in the atmosphere (free nitrogen), fixing nitrogen (bacteria), animal, soil, lightning, plants such legumes nitrogen-freeing bacteria, waste, decomposers. At each station students will record which station they are assigned to and at each station they will read a card to tell them what the nitrogen atom is doing and tell them which station to travel to next. Ideally students will make it through to each station and see the course that a nitrogen atom goes through. This will be a natural course of nitrogen without the interference of human impact.
Activity 2
- Students will research how humans impact the nitrogen cycle by point and nonpoint pollution. Point pollution caused by sewage being directly dumped into the Long Island Sound and nonpoint pollution by surface runoff from fertilizers used on lawns and farms. Students will make a list of ways they could do to reduce pollution.
Activity 3
-Students will participate in polluting a Connecticut river by simulating the following pollution added to the river: Trash (paper dots) from careless picnickers near the river who did not properly dispose of their trash; motor oil (pancake syrup) from cars and trucks unknowingly leaking oil onto the roads that are near the river; soil from a newly plowed farm; fertilizer (sugar) from a newly-built lawn community; salt from the roads treated for ice; sewage (red food color) from a malfunctioning sewage treatment plant; and toxic waste (blue or green food coloring) from a leaky barrel buried in the toxic waste dump. Adapted from the script named Fred the Fish from Watersheds as Learning Places: Urban Resource Initiative (URI). Students have been previously taught about the water cycle from the Weather and Ecosystems unit.
Students will work cooperatively to devise a system to clean the river they polluted. After getting background knowledge from textbook reading from Prentice Hall: Earth’s Water, students will learn how municipalities deal with cleaning drinking water and wastewater. They will use several methods such as filtration, coagulation, sedimentation, chlorination, evaporation and condensation. Other possibilities could be desalination by freezing or boiling. Once their systems has been designed, students will put their ideas to the test. Note: There will be no complete way to test how efficient their design worked. The water will be judged by its clarity. Students will cooperatively design a brochure to sell their system to a municipality, such as New Haven.
Activity 4
- Students will model a river by using fine sand in a large bin pitched at an angle to show that rivers form at higher altitudes and run downhill due to gravity. The source of the river will come from a plastic water bottle with a small pinhole towards the bottom of the bottle. Once the river process starts and they see how water can transform the land, the students will label meanders; braided forks; the source of the river; deltas; the mouth of the river which is the Long Island Sound which is the ocean or bay. Once all of the labels have been placed in the containers, students will add houses and buildings (Lego pieces) and dams (plastic transparency piece) to see how these obstruct the flow of the river. They will drill a hole in the sand and add yellow food coloring to simulate a defected toxic waste dump that is leaching into the groundwater supply. When it rains (spray bottle with blue food coloring) they will see how it affects the river and the Long Island Sound because the water will turn green. Adapted from River Cutters from Watersheds as Learning Places: Urban Resource Initiative.
Activity 5
- Students will research one of the three main rivers in Connecticut, the Thames, the Housatonic, and the Connecticut Rivers and design a diorama to show the source, what towns the river flows through, and the mouth of the river which is the Long Island Sound. A diorama is a three-dimensional model using a shoebox which depicts a scene in miniature-size by placing objects, figures, etc. in front of a painted background.
Activity 6
- Students will participate in the Connecticut statewide embedded task called “Dig In” where they will test the percolation and absorbency rates of several soil samples in order to research which plants will grow best in the types of soils they test. They will have a sample of sand, clay, potting soil, and soil from the schoolyard. They will identify certain characteristics of each soil type, giving detail descriptions of the properties of the soils such as color, texture, grain size, odor, and streak test. Students will record their observations in a data table.
Ongoing Activity -
Throughout the unit students will make matchbook foldables for new vocabulary words. Colorful construction paper will be cut 2 inches by 6 inches. It will be folded almost in half, leaving about ¼ inch at bottom, which will be folded up to look like a matchbook. On the front cover of the matchbook, students will draw a picture of the key term or concept. On the ¼ inch folded flap, the term/concept will be written. On the inside top part of the matchbook, the definition will be added. On the bottom part, students will use the term/concept in a meaningful sentence. These matchbooks will be glued into their science interactive notebooks and can be assigned for homework.
Key vocabulary terms:
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Eutrophication
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Filtration
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desalination
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Chlorination
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Coagulation
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Sedimentation
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Aeration
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Runoff
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Groundwater
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Percolation
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Absorption
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Meander
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Delta
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Evaporation
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Precipitation
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Condensation
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Transpiration
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Reservoir
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Estuary
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Point source pollution
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Nonpoint source pollution