Learning Science in the 7-8 at PDS!

A cascade.  This is what happens when sediment gets into the water.  One thing leads to another, and suddenly the water doesn’t hold enough dissolved oxygen to support life.  To make matters worse, most aquatic animals are poikilotherms, so they need more oxygen if water heats up–which means it holds less oxygen.

We read the Sediment Files and summarized the research on a 3X3 gird–a nice way to show how “one thing leads to another.”

Thank you to the day’s digital documentors!

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We have been investigating the reaction that happens when a Mentos is places in a 2L bottle of Diet Coke.  This reaction is an internet  sensation. It is complex reaction where the Mentos plays a big physical and chemical roll.  After doing experiments, it is finally time to write up the experiment in the form of a scientific paper.  Each group is writing together to produce the paper so the four major sections are divided up among the group members.  It has taken a lot of collaboration, both in school and outside of school.

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The old saying is, when it rains, it pours.  In the Gray Area, when it rains, it deposits sediment into the streams.

We really thought the timber areas, especially the area of clear cutting, was going to be the worst section of the Gray Area.  But, it turns out that the areas with the most sediment, the lowest water clarity, are coming from the other side of the Gray Area.  The problem seems to be from Parallel Park or the farming community.  Thanks to digital documenter Violet.

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In came a blender, a head of red cabbage, Perrier, and some very fine European white wine vinegar. and Windex.
Cabbage juice turns colors according to the pH of the liquid it is mixed with. The colors are gorgeous! This was a very flashy make-your-own! It ended with a few cabbage kippas.

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We returned from our week at Nature’s Classroom!
The two big topics this week were: Energy in Earth’s Atmosphere and how to write a Discussion section.
Energy comes at earth from the sun. We feel heat as infrared radiation. We see “visible” light. We don’t see ultraviolet radiation, but it does burn our skin.

These sorts of energy are defined in human terms. We can make infrared visible through night vision goggles. Color can be described in many ways and needs almost every form of science, from physics to anthropology to truly cover the topic. Other animals can see UV radiation. We looked at a flower to see what it would look like if we had the vision of a bee.

Here are some photos of the seventh grade classes:

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It was Make your Own science class today. A double header in one class, and a then neurobiology for the other class.
Here is Maggie’s log for her class about blood typing:
Today I got to teach my make your own science class. My topic was blood typing. First I gave a presentation saying that blood typing is important because it saves lives during blood transfusions. Then a little bit about the history of blood typing! Then we got to blood type some synthetic blood! (Just as fun!) We took drops of synthetic blood and combined it with certain serums, and looked to see if the blood had clotted. Then we decided what types of blood they were with that information! SO MUCH FUN!!!! =D

And Noam wrote about his class:
Today in class we learned about fireworks. We learned that heating atoms to extreme temperatures makes the colors in fireworks; they release wavelengths. We did a flame test to see which chemicals released different colors. Potassium proved to have the best color, which was a bright violet red. One of the groups did not get a very good result, but the other one was happy with what happened.

And Claire wrote about hers:
To laugh, you have to use 5 parts of your brain, and there was plenty of brain parts being used as we laughed. We watched the mask illusion, as a magical hollow mask appeared 3D before our every eyes. We confused our brain by making it think we had 2 noses. Then we split up and tried a whole bunch of different activities to play with our brain. We used almost all of our senses. We ended the class by spinning around the Chapman Room so much we were dizzy and sick. That was an AWESOME part of the class. Then, the moment that everyone had forgot about because they were having too much fun… getting our tests back. It ended up as a great class today, and thanks to everyone for learning about such a difficult concept that even some scientists still can’t explain.

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Welcome to data day!  By the end of the class, everyone had a graph!
Data Day! Workshop with 7th on PhotoPeach

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Why is it hard to breath on top of Mt. McKinley if there is the same perceof oxygen as at sea level?  The answer lies in the concept of percent, density and what happens to the atmosphere when altitude changes.

We also did a demo with the convection tube.  Using smoke as a dye to let us see the air in the tube, we added smoke to the cold and warm air tubes, both from the top and the bottom.  Watching the cold air tube was especially interesting.  Smoke doesn’t always rise, does it?

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Mt McKinley

If you go up to the top of Mt McKinley and take a breath, you will breath in 21% oxygen. If you take a breath in Poughkeepsie, you will also breath in 21% oxygen. But everyone knows that it is harder to breath at high altitude. How can the percent be the same? Resolving this paradox led us to describe the relationship between altitude and pressure and density and pressure.

Everyone also started to make the Figures for their science symposium paper. We started with a naked graph– just an X and a Y axis. Next, were the data continuous or categorical? That determines whether or not the data are going to be shown in a line or column graph. Next, what is the general relationship?

Finally, students entered the data into Excel and asked Excel to make the figure that the study required.

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