So far you have worked with some interesting chemicals completing a traditional Environmental Inquiry using Duckweed (Lemna) for a Bioassay. Not only have you performed a standard lab, you have also been preparing a non-traditional method of learning Environmental Studies by creating an educational presentation for elementary students and their families.
Your response in today's blog (September 20th) will cover the said two topics. First, you will reflect on the Duckweed Bioassay, so answer the following questions: What good will knowing the LD50 of a specific chemical on a small aquatic plant called Duckweed? How effective or valid is this type of experiment in understanding the role humans have in the environment? Explain to the general public how to interpret the results of your experiment.
Second you will reflect on your progression of creating an educational presentation for Hartley and Elliot Elementary Schools. Answer the following questions: What are YOUR expectations for the Nature Night you will participate in? Why is it important to engage children in the natural world? Predict the impact your presentation will have on the children who visit your booth. Explain to a loved one or another adult who is close to you, the local and global importance of something as simple as a Nature Night presentation.
Be exact and honest with your explanations. I expect nothing less.
Sincerely,
Mr. Bittle
The importance of conducting bioassays on small, aquatic plants such as duckweed can be shown in a variety of ways. Because of it's size, duckweed is an optimal subject for bioassays. It is highly sensitive to chemicals, especially ones that may float at the surface of the water, since it is a floating plant. By determining the LD50, this gives us a better understanding of how the waste we disperse into the environment affects nature. It can also lead to better regulation of the toxins and wastes emitted from factories and treatment plants, and it can determine a safe level for wastes being introduced into an environment.
ReplyDeleteAt Nature Night, I hope to impact kids in a positive way and influence them to go outside more. By showing them how incredibly easy it is to make a kite with simple, environmentally friendly materials, I hope that this will encourage them to play outdoors instead of watching television. It is important to teach these fundamentals to young children because they are very impressionable, and if we want to see a change in our world for the better in future generations, we need to teach kids how to live sustainably while their perspectives on life are still malleable.
With the LD-50 experiment involving duckweed my group used an insect killing soap. At only 10% concentration it killed off all duckweed but at 1% majority of the duckweed were fine. The importance of knowing the LD-50 with duckweed is that it's a major producer for aquatic life. (Bottom of the food chain.) We're constantly dumping chemicals into our enviornment and without LD-50 experiments we wouldn't have any idea how they affect organisms.
ReplyDeleteThis is good for knowing how a chemical effects ONE organism but not an entire ecosystem. Yes by testing with a producer we can infer the affects the chemical might have on a food chain but it isn't enough usable data.
Creating an educational program is a lot of work even when you have the jist of your program already done. It is extremely important to get children outdoors and learning about the natural world at an early age so they'll want to protect it. My expectations are that we'll probably have some issues at the very beginning since this is the first time we have done a nature-night presentation but I think we'll be able to make an impact. Even if it's only three kids that we get through to maybe they'll show their friends how to make a simple kite out of recycled materials and how much fun it is to go run around outside and fly it.
I really hope that we'll be able to clearly demonstrate that non-electronic and practically free toys are even better than a GameBoy or XBox 360 or other gaming consol. Nebraska is mostly rual except Lincoln and Omaha but as we slowly expand in our towns and cities we need to leave nature as it is as much as we can. Without fresh air and grass how will we enjoy a walk home?
It's nice knowing the LD50 of an aquatic plant because then you know how strong a chemical is in the water by seeing if the plant is dying or not. This then shows you if the water is safe or not because these chemicals can and will affect you.
ReplyDeleteThis experiment is pretty effected because it is showing us how strong a chemical is when humans are putting them into wildlife or selling them.
The way to interpret the readings is by how many duckweed are still alive. If there is no duckweed alive then you know that the chemical is very toxic and killed them off, but when you look at how many duckweed are alive you then have to look at the concentration of the chemical. Thus resulting in how strong a chemical really is and how harmful it is to the environment.
My expectations for nature night is that the kids will love the activities. I would enjoy seeing all these different things on how to become more involved with the environment in a fun way.
It is important to engage them into the nature world because they are learning younger and it will influence them more than if they were adults trying to get involved. It will just start them off at a younger age.
My prediction is that the kids will want to go camping that night with their parents. They will want to try out all their own different equipment and "live" out in the wilderness for a night.
The local importance of nature night is that we are getting involved with the community to help better the community. We are showing a younger generation what is happening in the world and how they can help it. Globally this will get everyone in the mind set to help everyone out and to be nice to the environment as well as enjoy doing it.
Abby
The good that comes from knowing the LD50 of a specific chemical on a small aquatic plant called Duckweed is that you know at what level different items are toxic and you can translate that onto more complex organisms This is a valid experiment on understanding the role humans have in the environment because we don’t take into consideration of how toxic chemicals are to other organisms because we think if it doesn’t affect us then it wont affect them. From the results we proved that everything is toxic at some level over time. Our chemical substance was an all-natural bug spray, yet it still killed the duckweed within days or being exposed. So we just need to be more aware and conscious of what we are putting into our environment, so to keep the contamination levels to a low.
ReplyDeleteMy expectations for nature night will be that every person there will walk away with some new fact or information that will help them be more involved within nature. It is important for children to get engaged with nature so they can experience and appreciate it so they don’t use and abuse it in the future, since they will be the future of the world one day. Pine Cone Bird Feeders will help them get involved with nature by helping them feed the wildlife and hopefully find an appreciation for wild birds. It might influence them into continuing to be an active part of nature and make them aware of our environment. Nature Night will be very rewarding and a fun way to get the community involved with our environment in a positive helpful way.
~Haley
Knowing how toxic specific chemicals are to duckweed may help us know how toxic it will be on other organisms and how much you need of the chemical to alter an environment. Knowing how toxic a specific chemical is to duckweed relates to humans effect on the environment because we contaminate the environment so much by some of the small daily things we do. For example, in the lab, the small amount of chemical mixed with the duckweed still effected the duckweed, just like humans impact on the environment even by their small actions.
ReplyDeleteI expect Nature Night to run smoothly and for everyone to be prepared. It is important for children to get involved in the natural world because it will teach them to take care of the environment and that's something they can take with them when they grow up. I think that children will want to go outside and have their own picnic and want to plan environmentally friendly meals. It will also get them to play outside when their on their picnic.
Jami
1. Knowing the LD50 for duckweed is important because duckweed is a primary producer, many organisms feed off that. If a certain chemical would surpass the LD50 then the duckweed would die and many of the animal that feed off it. Doing the experiment helped me realize that the chemicals we put in the environment can kill of duckweed, and then we are affecting every organism above duckweed. What people need to realize is that the chemicals we introduce can come back and we can feel the effects. For example a man catches a fish that gets coated in a chemical, he takes it home and eats it. Thus the chemical is reintroduced in us.
ReplyDelete2. My goals for nature night are to show kids about bugs. To let them learn a little about bugs in the environment. After we show them a some info they can go and make there own bugs with our supplies we have. It’s important to show kids about bugs because then they are less likely to smash them, some bugs are even beneficial. I predict that the main children attending my booth would be guys because the are into that kind of things. Having these nature nights are important because it exposes kids to the wonders of the outdoors and the more they get involved the more they would want to protect their natural resources.
On my duckweed bioessay it reflected how the effects of anti-freeze with duckweed. The larger amounts of antifreeze with duckweed killed it and the lower amounts did no harm at all.
ReplyDeleteLD50 would completley kill the duckweed if there is a large amount......
Felicia
(will complete later)
The LD50 is an important measure to know about a specific plant of animal. In the Duckweed bioassay, the response of the duckweed to a natural soap is relevant to understanding human impact on a small part of a pond ecosystem.
ReplyDeleteThe bioassay is useful in understanding the effect of runoff chemicals on the environment. Duckweeds are autotroph, low on the food chain. Once the toxicity of their environment reaches a certain point, their population diminishes. This could have drastic consequences for all other organisms that rely on the duckweed for survival.
The general public should draw from the results of this bioassay by achieving a greater understanding on how pollutant runoff can drastically affect the enviroment. While at some concentrations, organisms seem unaffected, after a certain point, there will be serious damage to the ecosystem.
The nature night will be a great opportunity for children to experience fun, friendly activities. I expect this will be an experience for them to emulate in other parts of their lives. I believe this could be their first exposure to an experimental ethic so the presentations must develop a positive mindset in them.
I think children would love to create their own kites, since they could create something cool enough to fly with their own scraps.
Nature nights are important to develop eco-consciousness in children at a young age. If you can spur kids to develop that kind of mindset, then the next generation can encourage change for a more eco-friendly world.
Knowing this information about how these chemicals effect duckweed will help me to be more cautious about what chemicals i use and how i use them and where in the environment i use them.
ReplyDeleteThis is a remotely effective way to study the effect that humans have on the environment, i think it would be more effective if we got to use a chemical that we know we use in our everyday life and see the effects that we personally have on the environment every single day.
The results of the experiment can be interpreted by looking at the effects of different amounts of the chemical being put into the duckweed, you can see that the more of the chemical there is, the more duckweed dies, the duckweed was effected in bad ways in every amount of concentration, it just was less effected in the lower concentrations.
My expectations for the nature night are good ones, i expect that there will be hundreds of students and they will all be interested in everything that we bring for them to do.
Its important to engage kids the the nature world because if we don't they wont take care of their environment because they wont know anything about it so as of now they don't realize that they have an effect on their environment and little things that they do could be killing some of the animals and plants that they play around with, and see everyday. If we don't teach kids about their environment then its not going to get taken care of and eventually we would have nothing left.
My activity is about turtles, i think it will have a huge effect on the kids lives because turtles can be found in a lot of places, a lot of families take their kids camping and most times there will be a lake at the place they are camping and most likely there are going to be turtles present, either in the lake or on the land. I hope to teach the students to take care of a turtle if they ever were to come across one in their environment.
A nature night is a night where students from elementary schools come back to their school after hours to experience many different activities put on by many different people, such as pioneers park, and even the students at LSW, we think up activities to teach the kids about things in nature and we go to the schools and teach them about it, hoping that they will learn how to properly care for things in their environment.
Knowing how the LD50 of a chemical will effect duckweed is important because it shows me how even the smallest amount of a chemical can kill a plant. The larger amount of Antifreeze we had the less likely the duckweed was to survive.... will finish later
ReplyDeleteJenna
The bioassay we performed with duckweed, does do some good because since we know what levels of toxicity of certain toxins that duckweed can withstand then we go use that with other relateable organisms. Our results of the bioassay(that duckweed were killed/hurt at every level of Malathion toxicity) helped show that we humans are constantly introducing toxins into ecosystems and its hurting wildlife.
ReplyDeleteFor Nature Night,I expect it to be just a really fun night, with different organizations teaching kids about nature and hopefully kids at Elliot and Hartley will start to want to be outside and enjoy nature instead of staying inside. I think it is important to engage children in the natural world because I think they would have a lot more fun outside rather then inside watching tv or whatever, if they actually have things to do outside. Like picnics, because what kid doesn't like picnics, and we will teach them how to do it in an easy and environmentally friendly way.
Brynn
1)It is good to know this because we will know what kills half of the plants and the other half will be kept alive by the TC50 and how to continue this onto other complex organisms. This experiment shows that no matter what humans will always affect the environment, whether small or big. Using all natural things can still kill living things. With the information we gathered we can test other chemicals to find a better way to interact with the environment without killing it.
ReplyDelete2)Nature Night is going to be a very professional night, where you will teach little kids about their environment and how to utilize it. But you should still have fun with the kids. We need to teach the kids of today about treating the environment better so that they can continue in hopes of a better future. Teaching the kids how to make a bird feeder in your own home is a good way to get kids to learn about wildlife and how to help and treat it better. With the information we will teach them how to interact with equality in their minds.
Tony
1-The dose/response experiment was a great way to make us aware of actually how toxic and harmful simple chemicals can be. The organism duckweed was a great test subject because of how abundant it is and the characteristics it has. It is helpful to know the LD50 of a chemical because it shows you how much of a certain substance an organism can take, for example how much toxins we can disperse in to the environment before these organisms start to break. The bioassay was a great way to look at the effect humans have on our environment, with just 10 percent concentration of a supposedly and all natural substance it killed the organism duckweed with in the first 24 hours. The experiment only makes me imagine how negatively dumping chemicals from factories and other places effects our aquatic areas.
ReplyDelete2- My expectations for nature night on Thursday is to have a good turnout of kids that show up and that the kids who do are actually interested in the environment and want to learn about what us groups have to offer. It is important to engage children in the nature world because first off its good to engage and get anyone involved in the nature aspect of the world but especially children because they are the ones who can make a difference. Teaching children at a young age the importance of preserving our environment is key to future success. If I had to make a prediction about the impact that I will make at Nature Night I would say it is going to get more people involved in the outdoors and to go camping, I am guessing that the kids will be intrigued by the hobby and hopefully convince their parents at trying camping.
Knowing how the LD50 of a chemical will effect duckweed is important because it shows me how even the smallest amount of a chemical can kill a plant. The larger amount of Antifreeze we had the less likely the duckweed was to survive. People dont really stop and think about the effects of things they do. If a tiny amount of chemicals can kill a plant, what would a larger amount do to a human? its important to be aware of these types of things.
ReplyDeleteMy expectations for Nature night are very high, i think it will be very fun and the kids will enjoy it. Since the barefoot hiking was requested i think the kids will be excited to see it back. Its a good way to not only get the kids and parents out for the night, but its somehting they can continue to do on their own time. Its important to teach kids about nature at an early age so that they can grow up with it and learn good habbits from the start. I predict the kids will enjoy being able to kick off their shoes and walk around safely on rocks and other things from nature.
Jenna
The duckweed experiment was really interesting. A lot more than i thought it would be. I learned that chemicals can be very good and very bad for plants. I thought that since Miracle Gro is supposed to help plants grow that it would make all of the plants thrive and do very well, but that was not the case. A lot and pretty much almost all of our duckweed died. I do not think that the chemical did any good for the duckweed. It made me wander how the chemcials that are around us everyday are slowly killing us, because i think thats what they are doing. Or making our bodies weaker to fight off things we would normally be able to fight off.
ReplyDeleteI am very excited for nature night. I was gone all the days that we worked on the presentation but I am still going with and helping on thursday night. I have very high expectation of this nature night as well. I expect our group to have a positive influence on the children. I am really excited to interact with the children that are at hartley elementary. I really think that teaching the children about turtles, will help all the kids out with learning how to help the children in their environment if they were to perhaps stumble upon a turtle. :) I really think the kids will take a lot out of it.
1. Knowing the LD50 of duckweed tells us how much of a concentration of a certain chemical we will be able to allow affect duckweed. Also our bioassay is very effective in experimenting the role of humans on the environment. It shows that if we let a chemical get out of hand it could severely damage the ecosystem of out world. Our results can be interpreted as the herbal armor bug spray having a negative effect with a LD50 of 1 day in concentrations of .1%/ or higher and 2-3 days for .001% or higher
ReplyDelete2.My expectations for nature night are high. I believe that our presentation will go off without a flaw. I believe it's important to engage kids in the natural world because you need to teach them the the environment is important and we need to preserve it. Also it doesn't hurt to hook them while their young to save the environment. Our presentation will have parents and kids alike wanting to go camping and hiking on weekends. They will want to spend time with nature and explore with the new skills we taught them and if they get lost they can create a compass like how we will teach them.
Alex W
On my duckweed bioessay it reflected how the effects of anti-freeze with duckweed. The larger amounts of antifreeze with duckweed killed it and the lower amounts did no harm at all. LD50 would completley kill the duckweed if there is a large amount.
ReplyDeletemy expectations of nature night are very high. I'm really excited to teach the kids how to barefoot hike. I hope that the parents get involved also and actually consider barefoot hiking after their visit. I think the kids would love it, because i know if i was a kid i would love to go barefoot hiking and learn about it.
The good knowing the LD50 of a specific chemical on a small aquatic plant called Duckweed is you see how chemicals can change certain organisms and the environment. we used some kind of pesticide used for killing insects that feed on growing fruits and vegetables. This pesticide was called Malathion. It has a very strong odor that can be harmful to humans. But as we studied our experiment, we noticed that it turned most of the duckweed into a white color. we could see that many chemicals that people dump into water streams or trash can harm many organisms in the environment and possibly kill them as well.
ReplyDeletemy expections of nature night are high. i hope i do well in teaching many children on how to make sidewalk chalk. for some it would be a great experience for them and it will get them the chance to let them go outdoors if they try to make there own sidewalk chalk in there freetime. not only will it get kids involve in making chalk but also the parents. instead of being stuck at home all day why not make chalk and enjoy the outdoors. in doing this many people could learn more about the environment and how it interacts with everybody.