EET Workshops Implementation
Use this template to share the results of how you have incorporated the techniques of an EET chapter into your teaching. Let us know how you used the EET in the classroom by describing the projects and activities that you carried out with your students. In addition to this template, post a PowerPoint presentation or a text file with screen shots to document your results.
Name: Bhavna Rawal
Position and school: Science Teacher
Title of the EET Chapter on which you based your Project or Activity: Life in Extreme Environments
Dataset Used: underwater extreme environments
Tool Used: GeoMapApp, Excel
Project/Activity Question(s):
· How can life exist in high pressure, lack of oxygen, lack of sunlight, toxins, extreme heat, extreme cold?
Project/Activity Goal(s):
· Students will be able to explain the what kind of adaptations might need to survive.
1. Brief Description of the Project/Activity (What did students do?): Ask students what the word “Extreme” means to them.
2. Ask what extreme places on the Earth and under the ocean they can think of.
3. Ask what makes them extreme.
4. Make a list together of the typical underwater extreme environments. (Deep trenches, thermal vents, volcanoes, bottom of glaciers)
5. Discuss why they are considered extreme. You may start by asking what most life needs to survive and asking if they think those are present in these spots. Work towards creating this list (High pressure, lack of oxygen, lack of sunlight, toxins, extreme heat, extreme cold)
6. Ask students if they think anything can survive in these places. Some students will know of deep water fish. Talk about what kind of adaptations they might need to survive.
7. Introduce the term “Extremophiles” and break apart it’s meaning.
8. Show students some pictures of Extremophiles and have kids guess which extreme environment they might be from. You may want to give them clues about each organism, and then discuss what it is and where it’s really from.
9. Ask students how you think we discovered these organisms.
10. Discuss the work of scientists who discover Extremophiles and look at http://www.womenoceanographers.org/doc/MSummit/Lesson/MelLesson.htm together if possible.
11. Ask why studying Extremophiles may be important to discovering life on other planets.
Number of Students (With how many students did you carry out the project?) 50
Time Spent on the Project/Activity (How many hours or class periods did the project/activity take?): 2 class period
Your Reflections on the Project/Activity:
· How do you feel the project/activity went with students?
· What sorts of questions did student ask? What insights did they have? How proficient are students in using the dataset and/or tool of the EET chapter?
· How will you carry out this project/activity differently in the future?
In addition to this template, please post a PowerPoint presentation or a text document with screen shots to document your results. Include examples of representative student work (without names) and any handouts or introductory materials you may have provided to accompany the project/activity.
If the materials you used come from other sources and are copy written, please cite where they come from. If you developed the materials you used, then please cite them with Your Name, Copyright Year. For example, Susan Smith, Copyright 2006.
I think the project went very well with students. Everyone seemed to understand it very easily. Students kept asking how life could exist in these high-temperature, acidic, toxic environments. Students asked about life on Mars.