Problem-Based Learning in a Professional Learning

CommunityPresenters:

Iya Keturah Monroe, Executive Director of O.U.R.S.E.P., Inc.

Joan Tucker, Assistant Director of O.U.R.S.E.P., Inc.

Joan Tucker is the Assistant Director of O.U.R.S.E.P., a certified and celebrated K-8 teacher of the NJ public school system for ten years, and currently holds a Masters degree in Curriculum Development from Walden University. She has been instrumental in facilitating several cultural and educational enrichment events for students in the Trenton community and she truly embodies the practice of experiential learning in the classroom.

Introductions

2009 NJ Core Curriculum Content Standards in Science: What is different?

Part I: Problem-Based Learning-Model lessons

Lesson A: The Science of Food Production

Overview: Teachers will compare Greenhouse farming methods to Hydroponic farming methods. Cumulative progress indicators in Science practices (5.1), Physical Science (5.2), Life Science (5.3), and Earth Systems Science (5.4), will be addressed.

Agenda

Lesson B: Explore how land forms affect an ecosystem and its climate. ex. Destruction of farms due to mountain top removal

Lunch Break

Part II: Engaging activities that build skills

Overview: Teachers will explore topic strands in each of the content standard domains. Building on the 5E model of lesson planning, teachers will construct lesson outlines based on these engagement activities

Common Science Investigation (CSI) Overview: Teachers will investigate a Science mystery using O.U.R.S.E.P. CSI model for science skill building practice

OverviewThis is the NJCCC standard and strands that we will focus on today.

Content Area Science Standard 5.3 Life Science: All students will understand that life science principles

are powerful conceptual tools for making sense of the complexity, diversity, and interconnectedness of

life on Earth. Order in natural systems arises in accordance with rules that govern the physical world, and

the order of natural systems can be modeled and predicted through the use of mathematics.

Strand C. Interdependence : All animals and most plants depend on both other organisms and their

environment to meet their basic needs.

By the end of grade 12: Biological communities in ecosystems are based on stable interrelationships

and interdependence of organisms. 5.3.12.C.1 Analyze the interrelationships and interdependency

among different organisms, and explain how these relationships contribute to the stability of the

ecosystem. Stability in an ecosystem can be disrupted by natural or human interactions. 5.3.12.C.2

Model how natural and human-made changes in the environment will affect individual organisms and

the dynamics of populations.

ObjectivesObjectives: To develop instructional resources that support inquiry-based science teaching and develop new strategies for keeping “your standards” while following the NJCCCS.

By the end of the session, participants...●will generate a set of 5-E lesson plans around similar themes that can be modified to meet individual classroom needs;●will develop at least one CSI scenario that will facilitate daily practice of basic science skills

5-E Alternative Farming Methods Lab

Engagement: Farm Picture Prompt/ Food Inc.Video

Explore: 5-E Alternative Farming Methods Lab

Explain: Educational Applications of Aquaponics, Farming

Fertilizer and the Environment, and Troubleshooting Healthy

Hydroponics

Elaborate: Making a Decision-Consequences Chart

Evaluate: Going Further

The Present Situation

What's going on in the Food Industry?

Food Inc. (see video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eKYyD14d_0

Focus questions:

How have farms changed in the last 50 years?

How has “faster, fatter, bigger, cheaper” affected the quality of our food?

Is the FDA advocating for our health interests?

What's really in your local grocery store?

Alternative Farming Methods Lab

.Hydroponic Procedures:

1. Gather materials for group2. Follow demonstration for hydroponic farm set-up

Greenhouse Procedures:1. First cut the bottle with sharp scissors or a razor knife one third from the top.

2. Place soil in the lower third with soil. Your soil should be moist, but not wet.

Note: You should be able to see through your plastic bottle at all times. If your bottle clouds up to a point where

you can't see what's inside, you should remove the bottle and let the soil dry out a little before replacing it.

3. Choose and add your new seed for germination

Note: Seeds need constant moisture to germinate properly. It's best to open the top of the bottle for a short

time every day,so mold doesn't grow on the soil.

4. Once the seedling has one set of true leaves, you should transfer to larger container to give more room for growth.

Warning: Never place the soda bottle greenhouse in full sun as it might get too steamy and drown the seedling.

Lab Materials

Greenhouse Method:

● 1 liter bottle

● 1 pair of scissors, razor

● Potting soil

● Duct Tape (Hinge for bottle)

● Gardening tools-gloves, shovel for soil

● Assorted seeds to choose from

● Newspaper for easy clean-up

● Paper cup to collect soil

Hyrdoponics Method:

● 1 liter bottle (transfer to 2 liter later)

● 1 16oz bottle

● 1 ft of plastic tubing

● Peat moss

● Plastic planter

● Dropper

● White cotton strips

● Lemon juice (for group)

● Ph Meter (for group)

● Pitcher of water (for group)

● Hot glue gun to secure tubing (for group)

Lab Questions and Observations

Think About It: Put yourself in the Farmers shoes.

1. Think about the things that all plants need to grow. What are some of the considerations you have to make for choosing a location of your farm?2. Could people have aquaponic farms in the city? Why/why not?3. Think about farm management.Would you have to hire people to manage your farm? What are the factors determining your decision?4. Could this be a new source of income? How long would it take to make aprofit from your hydroponic farm ?

Take Home Assignment:5. Make schedule to pump oxygen bubbles, check the pH of the water,supply nutrients to water and use chart below to compare growth in each farm. 6. Collect and record data over next 6 weeks from both AlternativeFarming Methods. Which farm is yielded the greatest results?

Comparison Growth Chart

Educational Applications of Food Production

Aquaponics and hydroponics are both excellent means of demonstrating many

principles of science, agriculture, math and business in all grade levels. A unit in

hydroponics or aquaponics enforces practical uses of chemistry, mathematics,

physics, economics and engineering. The monitoring and care of a hydroponic or

aquaponic system by students helps instill a sense of stability, inspires creativity and

creates excitement in the learning environment.

A small hydroponic garden can sit on a counter top and be used to demonstrate

botany, horticulture,hydroponics (soil less plant culture), plant science, nutrition,

physiology and care, nutrient and pH testing, pH relationships, plant usage of

nutrients, seed germination, photosynthesis and light and plant development. An

aquaponic system combines hydroponics with aquaculture in a recirculating system.

A unit in hydroponics or aquaponics can be started at the beginning of a semester

and run through the entire semester, allowing the educator to present the individual

concepts and lessons as the plants and fish develop and grow. A small hydroponic

or aquaponic system can sit on a spare counter top. Larger systems can be placed

on the floor of a classroom, in a windowsill or a greenhouse.

Aquaponic success in the classroom

Aquaponic farms are a healthy alternative.

Aquaponic class tour video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WgJy-oQ2cI&feature=more_related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acmysuOkG0Q

Research Articles

Research the following articles in your packet for a

current environmental or animal problem

related to food production. Choose one issue you

find interesting.

Then as an informed consumer, use your research

to Make a Decision about how your going to address

the issue going forward. Challenge yourself to make

a difference in your life and the lives of others.

Fertilizer Runoff Overwhelms Streams and Rivers--Creating Vast "Dead Zones"

The nation's waterways are brimming with excess nitrogen from fertilizer--and plans to boost biofuel production threaten to aggravate an already serious situation

By David Biello March 14, 2008 13

FERTILE RUNOFF: Nitrates from fertilizer as well as animal and human waste are carried by streams like this one in Wyoming to the sea where they cause vast dead zones. Image: ©LAURA JOHNSONThe ··water in brooks, streams and creeks from Michigan to Puerto Rico carries a heavy load of pollutants, particularly nitrates from fertilizers. These ··nitrogen and oxygen molecules that crops need to grow eventually make their way into rivers, lakes and oceans, fertilizing blooms of algae that deplete oxygen and leave vast "··dead zones" in their wake. There, no fish or typical sea life can survive. And scientists warn that a federal mandate to produce more biofuel may make the situation even worse.

Researchers led by aquatic ecologist Patrick Mulholland of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee report in Nature that streams and other waterways are losing their ability to filter excess nitrates from fertilizers and ··sewage. They discovered this by releasing a concentrated nitrate solution carrying an unusual isotope of nitrogen into 72 different streams—ranging from heavily altered urban waterways to pristine rivulets—and then tracked the isotope to find out how much made it downstream. The amount at the end indicated each stream's ability to naturally remove the pollutant—a measure of its health.

"We found that they continue to take up nitrate, but they remove a smaller fraction of the overall nitrate as you overload them," Mulholland says. "This is probably the reason we're seeing hypoxia [low oxygen levels] and other problems in coastal waters."

Typically, bacteria remove excess fertilizer from water through a chemical process known as ··denitrification, which enables them to convert nitrate to nitrogen that is then released into the atmosphere as a gas. The team found, however, that bacteria in the streams they studied only eliminated an average of 16 percent of the nitrogen pollution; bacteria in the most undisturbed streams performed best removing as much as 43 percent.

"Denitrification is the only process that we know for sure removes nitrogen from water," Mulholland says. "The other 84 percent [of the pollution] was just taken up by algae, microbes and other organisms in the stream bottom. A portion of that is probably also denitrified, and it could be a large portion. But we don't know that fate of that material."

What is clear is that a significant portion of such fertilizer is still making its way through the soil and water to the sea. As a result, ··algae and other microorganisms take up the nitrogen, bloom and, after they die, suck the oxygen out of coastal waters. Such "··dead zones" have appeared seasonally near most major river mouths, including those emptying into Maryland's Chesapeake Bay as well as the Gulf of Mexico, where lifeless waters now cover more than 7,700 square miles (20,000 square kilometers) during the summer months.

The bulk of this nitrate comes from fertilizer running off agricultural fields. Scientists warn that a boom in crops such as ··corn for biofuel will only make matters worse. Last year, U.S. farmers planted more than 90 million acres (35 million hectares) of corn for the first time since the 1940s as a result of growing demand for that crop for both fuel and food.

Based on this trend, geographer Simon Donner of the University of British Columbia and atmospheric scientist Christopher Kucharik of the University of Wisconsin–Madison predict that nitrogen pollution from the Mississippi River Basin—the nation's largest watershed—will increase as much as 34 percent by 2022 if corn kernels continue to be the source of a growing proportion of ··ethanol fuel that U.S. energy legislation mandates.

That would also make it almost impossible, they say, to reduce the New Jersey-size ··dead zone at the Mississippi's outlet into the Gulf of Mexico to less than 2,000 square miles (5,000 square kilometers), as recommended by a 2001 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency task force.

In fact, the scientists wrote this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the only way to increase ethanol production from corn and reduce nitrogen runoff would be for Americans to ··stop eating meat, thereby freeing up corn used as livestock feed for other uses.

Making a DecisionProcedure:

1.Identify an environmental issue.

2.Gather Information. Read about your issue in several publications.

3. Consider Values. Values are the things that you consider important. Examine the diagram below. Several values are given. Which values do you think apply most of the environmental issue you are considering? Are there other values that you believe will help you make a decision about the issue?Consider at least four values in making your decision.

4.Explore Consequences. Consequences are the things that result from a certain course of action. Use your table to organize your thoughts about consequences related to your environmental issue. List your values at the top. Fill in each space with the consequences of an action related to each of your values

5.Make a Decision. Thoroughly consider all of the consequences you have recorded in your table. Evaluate how important each consequence is. Make a decision about what course of action you would choose on the issue.

EnvironmentalDecisions

Effect onpeople's health

Creation ofenjoyable activities

Preservationof what is beautiful

or pleasing

Protection ofnatural resources

Knowledge gainedby research

A questionof right or wrong

Upholdingcultural traditions

Gain or lossof money or jobs

Materials Needed:Newspapers, magazines,and other publications containinginformation about environmental issues

Consequences

Analysis

6. In your evaluation, did you consider short-term consequences or long-term

consequences to be more important? Why?

7. Which value or values had the greatest influence on your final decision?

Explain your reasoning.

Going Further

Compare your table with your classmates' tables. Did you all make the same

decision about a similar issue? If not, form teams and organize a formal classroom

debate on a specific environmental issue.

O.U.R.S.E.P. CSI Demonstration

We have developed a series of common science

investigations (CSI) that support skill building and

allow teachers and students to engage in daily

practice while having fun! Develop your own

scenario around today's topic and get your students

excited about science practices and problem solving.

CSI: The Aquaponics Class CaperA crime has been committed! Our biggest female Tilapia

Tammy, has been stolen from the Aquaponic class fish tank.

She is to be sold for breeding to an organic fish farm raiser

next week and he's willing to pay the school top dollar. We

need the money for the Biotechnology program so that we

can teach more students how to develop their own

Aquaponic farm. Some of the kids have grown attached to

Tammy and were very upset when they heard the news

about her leaving, but selling her is for a good cause.

Can you find out which students are responsible for Tammy's disappearance?

The students are the only people with motive and

access to Tammy, so they are the only people

being considered for the crime. No charges will be

filed against the students responsible. We just want

Tammy back. Use your Common Science

Investigation skills to process the evidence,

compare and contrast witness testimony and find

the perpetrators. Please help us CSI!

O.U.R.S.E.P.-CSI Procedures:

●Make observations of model crime scene

●Question witnesses (Keturah and Joan)

●Develop possible scenario (form hypothesis)

●Collect physical evidence (data)

●Classify all evidence and mark: Exhibit A, B, C etc.

●Measure height and weight and waist size of each suspect (in cm/kg).

●Measure height of fish tank and how much water is inside (in cm/ml)

●Use SI measurements of fish tank and suspects to develop physical profile of perpetrator. Convert units where applicable.

●Make Venn Diagram of witness testimonies. Check for inconsistencies.

●Identify possible perpetrator and his/her accomplice.

●Discuss analysis with members of your CSI Team

●Draw conclusions/Discuss motive (connect to environmental issue)

●Make Evaluations/Assessments

●Note: Student has to be at least __cm to get into tank without help.