The Goal of This Week-Long Study of Biology Is to Give the Students an Understanding Of

Biology

Introduction

Objective:

The goal of this week-long study of biology is to give the students an understanding of what conditions are necessary for life. They will learn what these conditions are, how they are obtained, and what will happen if they are not met. They will also learn what types of things biologists study.

Background:

Biology is the study of life. “Bio” means life, and “ology” means “study of”. Biologists study living things and life processes. There are many different types of “-ologists” that study different aspects of life (see “Types of Biologists). Life is what makes a rock different from a plant. During this week the students will learn what “life” is and how it is maintained. There are seven characteristics that an object must display in order to be considered alive. It must grow, move, take in nourishment, reproduce its own kind, respond to stimuli, breath, and excrete waste materials. There are many objects that display one or more of these characteristics that are not alive. For example, some machines move and respond to stimuli, but they are not alive. A photocopier reproduces, but it is also not alive. An object must display all seven of these characteristics.

There are also certain things that are required to maintain life. An organism needs very few things in order to survive, despite what humans decide they “need” in order to live. They need only food, water, air, and shelter from intolerable weather conditions. Without food the organism will starve, without water the organism with become dehydrated, without air it will be asphyxiated, and without shelter it can die from weather conditions and exposure.

Different types of Biologists

Botanist- studies plants

Ecologist- studies relationships between organisms and their environment

Entomologist- studies insects

Herpetologist- studies amphibians and reptiles

Ichthyologist- studies fish

Paleontologist- studies fossils and ancient life forms such as dinosaurs

Pathologist- studies disease-causing organisms

Ornithologist- studies birds

Zoologist- studies animals (often broken into invertebrate and vertebrate)

Biology

State Standards and Benchmarks

Oregon Standards for 3rd and 5th grade

Life Science- Diversity/ Interdependence

Oregon Common Curriculum Goals:

Understand the relationships among living things and between living things and their environments.

Benchmarks:

Grade 3: Describe a habitat and the organisms that live there.

Grade 5: Describe the relationship between characteristics of specific habitats and the organisms that live there.

Life Science-Organisms

Oregon Common Curriculum Goals:

Understand the characteristics, structure, and functions of organisms.

Benchmarks:

Grade 3:Recognize characteristics that are similar and different between organisms.Describe the basic needs of living things.

Grade 5: Group or classify organisms based on a variety of characteristics. Describe basic plant and animal structures and their functions.

Physical Science-Energy

Oregon Common Curriculum Goals:

Understand energy, its transformations, and interactions with matter.

Benchmarks:

Grade 3:Identify common types and uses of energy.

Grade 5: Identify forms of various types of energy and their effects on matter. Describe examples of energy transfer.

Biology

Vocabulary

Abdomen
Agar
Air
Anal Fin
Antennae
Antibiotics
Asphyxiate
Bacterium (Bacteria)
Budding
Cap
Carbon Dioxide
Caudal Fin
Chlorophyll
Coal
Compound eye
Conserve
Consumers
Contaminate
Cotyledon
Culture
Decomposers
Dehydrated
Desiccated (Dried Out)
Domino Patterns
Dormant
Dorsal Fin
Ecosystem
Energy
Energy Loss
Exponential Growth
Eye
Food
Fungus (Fungi)
Germ
Gill Slit
Gills
Growth
Habitat
Head
Herbivores
Hypha (Hyphae)
Jointed leg
Leaf
Life
Mandibles (jaws)
Medium
Microorganisms (Microbes)
Mouth
Mushroom
Mycelium (Mycelia)
Natural Gas
Natural Resources
Necrotic (Dead Tissue)
Non-Renewable Resources
Omnivores
Organism
Oxygen
Parasite
Parent Cell
Pathogen
Pectoral Fin
Pelvic Fin
Photo Response
Photosynthesis
Pigment
Predators
Primary Consumers
Producers
Renewable Resources
Respiration
Roots
Scent
ScentConsumers
SeedEnergy
Shelter
Simple Leaves
Soil
Solar Energy
Spore
Stalk
Stem
Surface Area
Swab
Thorax
Transfer
Transpiration
Variable
Veins
Virus
Water
Yeast

Biology

Lesson Index

Lesson:

Bean Growth

Dissecting Fungi

Energy Transfer

Environmental Swab Plate Growth

Feed the Yeast

Leaf Slide Show

M&M Resources

Make a Habitat

Observing Fish and Insect Parts

Nature’s Tea

Web of Life

Page:

Biology

Bean Growth

Grades K-5 (with variations)

Overview:

Students learn about the needs of a living organism by growing beans and studying what happens to the ones that do not have certain necessary things.

Time:40 minutes set-up on day 1, 15 minutes observation on days 2-5

Materials:

For the class:

Water
Opaque bag (a paper bag works)
Bean Growth Stickers (1 page)

For each pair of students:

1 Lima bean (a seed variety will work much better than ready-to-cook beans)
1 Bean of another variety
Zip-loc bag
Paper towel
1 Bean Growth Worksheet

Background:

In order to survive, a plant needs food, water, air, and light (another form of energy aside from food). If any of these are taken away the plant will not survive for any extended period of time.

A plant’s source of food for the first part of its life comes from inside the seed, rather than from soil. The first pair of leaves found inside a seed are known as a cotyledon, and they get their nutrients from the seed for the first few days of its life. Once the plant has roots, it is able to absorb soil nutrients from an external source in the soil. Upon germination, the cotyledon emerges, enlarges and becomes green.

Without water a plant will become dehydrated and die, just like an animal. Plants draw up water through the roots through a series of vessels and veins. Water is lost out the leaves through transpiration.

Just as people need to breath, plants also take in a gas and convert it into another gas, a process called respiration. Unlike animals, which take in oxygen and convert it to carbon dioxide, a plant takes in carbon dioxide and converts it to oxygen.

A significant difference between plants and animals is a plant’s use of light for energy, using a process called photosynthesis. The chlorophyll in leaves and green parts of plants makes this possible. Without light a plant will turn lighter color or white and will eventually die. Animals can not perform this function and we must get our energy through other sources, such as eating plants or eating animals that have eaten plants. Otherwise, we could feed ourselves by standing in the sun!

Setup:

Some beans will need to be soaked overnight so that they are soft enough to pull open. Be careful not to soak them so long that they fall apart. Most of the beans can just be left in a wet paper towel overnight.

Activities/procedure:

Pass out a zip-loc bag, a paper towel, a lima bean, and another bean variety to each of the students. Decide, in groups of five (leaders may need to participate or make extra bags), who is going to take away food, water, air, OR light, (each student will only remove one variable) and who will give the plant everything it needs (perhaps the leader). Label each bag accordingly. Place the two beans inside a folded paper towel and put them in the zip-loc bag.

For the beans that get everything (the control): pour a small amount of water into the bag to wet the paper towel. You don’t want it to dry out, but you don’t want lots of standing water, or the seeding will rot. Leave the bag open and in a well-lit area, but not in direct sun. These beans should sprout the best, and in about 5 days, they should have green leaves starting to uncurl and roots growing through the paper towel. At this point, they will have almost used up the nutrients supplied by the seed, and they will be searching out more from the soil through its roots. The green color in the leaves indicate that they are starting to undergo photosynthesis and are producing chlorophyll.

For the beans that get no food: After soaking the bean in water, remove the seed coat, separate the halves of the seed and remove the small plant from inside. This is the cotyledon. This seedling will not be able to feed off of the bean.The small cotyledon will dry up quickly and die in the absence of nutrients.

For the beans that get no water: If the beans have been soaked, leave the paper towel dry. Place the bag open in a well-lit area. If they have not been soaked, wet the paper towel like the others, however, give it no more water. This bean may sprout if it is wet in the start, but it will not continue to grow in the absence of water.

For the beans that get no air: Wet the paper towel, seal the bag and leave it in a well-lighted location. This bean may actually sprout quite well, and look good at first. There is not a huge amount of air underground where these beans start to grow. However, after a few days without air, the sprout will start to get limp and look wimpy. Without the gas exchange from respiration, the seedling will soon die.

For the beans that get no light: Wet the paper towel, leave the bag open and place it inside another bag that will not allow light to come in, such as a paper bag. This bean will probably also look pretty good at first, since there is no light underground, and seeds will sprout in the dark. The sprouts will then grow towards the light, and the roots away from it, which is called a photo response. By the end of the week, these sprouts may start to look lighter in color and will probably not grow as vigorously as the sprouts exposed to light.

On the following days, add water to each of the bags (if needed), except the one that gets no water, and leave them in the same condition as before. Have the students make observations and draw pictures about the growth of their plants. Compare the growth of the beans under different conditions in each group.

Extension: “Inside a Seed”

AskHow does a plant begin? How does a seed turn into a plant. Give each student a seed been that has been soaked in water so it is easier to open. Show them how to open the seeds carefully. (They fall apart, so you must be gentle!) Ask students to see if they can find out how a seed turns into a plant. They should be able to find a small white or pale green cotyledon, or baby plant. After looking on their own, have them help friends find out why. Have them talk about it with their groups as they look. Make sure every child sees a baby plant. Have they label the seed and the baby plant on their Dissecting Plants and Seeds worksheet.

Discussion:

Talk about the needs of a plant. It needs food, water, air, and light. Compare that to what an animal needs.
Which plants grew the best (under which conditions)? (Plants with all of the resources)
Why didn’t some of the plants grow? (Plants need all four to grow well)
What happened to each of the plants that had something taken away? (They died/withered/did not grow as well)

Vocabulary:

Chlorophyll
Cotyledon
Dehydrated
Growth
Life
Photosynthesis
Photo Response
Respiration
Transpiration
Variable

Biology

Dissecting Fungi

Grades K-5 (with variations)

Overview:

Students will learn the different parts of fungus and compare them to the parts of a seed plant.

Time: 20-30 minutes

Materials:

For each student:

An “Observing Seed Plants” and mushrooms worksheet

For each student pair:

1 mushroom for each student- grocery store variety
1 plastic knife
1 paper or plastic plate
1 magnifying glass

Teaching/demo materials:

Either and overhead of the worksheet answer key or an individual key for each group
A seed plant that can be used for part comparison. A house plant or vegetable start works well.

Background:

There are over 100,000 different species of fungi. The largest are several feet in diameter, while the smallest are microscopic.

Plants reproduce using seeds, which sprout to form a seedling. Fungi reproduce by way of spores, which do not sprout. Instead, they send out threadlike hyphae which form a web like mass of mycelia(plural mycelium).

Fungi are generally classified by the type of structure that forms the spores. Two fungi that kids will be familiar with are mushrooms and mold. Spores on mushrooms are found in gills, compared to molds for example, which have spore cases that contain spores.

Mushrooms have many comparable parts to a seed plant. The mycelia of a mushroom are similar to the roots of a plant. The mushroom stalk is like a plant stem in that they both provide support. Seeds and spores can also be compared to each other, since they can both produce new organisms. The gills in mushrooms, and the spore cases in mold, are comparable to the flowers of flowering plants in that they are where propagative structures are formed.

The cap of the mushroom is only similar to a leaf in that it may provide some shelter to the reproductive structures of the organism. However, the cap does not provide food for the mushroom like a leaf does for a plant. Fungi do not undergo photosynthesis, has no chlorophyll, and is not green. It must get its nutrients from the things on which it grows. Fungi play an important part in our ecosystem, in that they act as a decomposer that breaks down dead organic matter.

Setup:

You must buy mushrooms at the grocery store shortly before this activity. Provide each team with the required supplies.

Activities/procedure:

Tell the kids that these are not poisonous mushrooms, but that many mushrooms are. They should never pick wild mushrooms without an adult present, and they should NEVER taste them! Review the “no tasting” rule for this activity. Talk to them about using the plastic knife carefully and always cutting away from themselves. Even a plastic knife can be dangerous!

Start off by observing a seed plant, and labeling all of the parts on the worksheet. Review what each of the structures do.

Have the kids remove the stem of their mushroom by carefully twisting it. They can then peal back the membrane over the gills and observe them. Now allow the kids to explore their mushroom by having them carefully cut into the different parts of their mushroom. As they do this, have them hypothesize what each structure is for, as they fill it out on their worksheet.

It is not a good idea to allow students to taste even grocery store mushrooms. Aside from health code issues, there also may be mushroom allergies. Plus, there seems to be a gag response that many younger kids experience when they try mushrooms. Personal experience, don’t ask.

Have the kids clean up their own area, and dispose of the mushrooms, then lead a discussion.

Discussion:

Questions to ask:

Does the mushroom get energy from the sun? Does it contain chlorophyll? (No- if it did, it would appear green. It gets its energy from decaying matter.)
How does a mushroom reproduce? (spores produced in the gills)
Where are the mushrooms mycelia? (they get cut off when harvested)

Vocabulary:

Cap
Fungus (Fungi)
Gills
Hypha (Hyphae)
Leaf
Mushroom
Mycelium (Mycelia)
Roots
Seed
Spores
Stalk
Stem

References:

Fungi- Small Wonders. Delta Science Module- DSM II. 13-18.

Biology

Energy Transfer

Grades K-5 (with variations)

Overview:

This activity is a fun outside water game that uses cups of water with holes in them to teach students about how energy is lost each time it is transferred between organisms. It also reinforces the idea of interconnectivity between species and the concept of a food chain.

Time:20 minutes

Materials:

For the class:

5-Five gallon buckets
Access to large amounts of water (hose)

For each student:

Large labeled Styrofoam cups or plastic containers (we used 64oz cups) with holes poked in the bottom.

Background: