Teacher Information

There were three key learning activities for this project.

1. A WebQuest for ecological terms that students would be using during the unit. The following are webquests that can be used.

http://www.cityofportsmouth.com/school/dondero/msm/pondlife/intro.html

2. Inquiry lab investigations where each lab team tested a different factor that could possibly impact a pond's ecosystem. Examples cold be pH, Dissolved Oxygen, Turbidity, Temperature, Phosphates etc. Students designed their lab protocols, conducted their experiments, and communicated their findings through both a formal lab report and an oral multimedia presentation to their peers.

Virtual Pond Dip
Creatures that you may find in a water sample
http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/index.html?http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/ponddip/index.html

Life Science Resources
Various demonstrations, infomation, labs, projects and more.
http://www.middleschoolscience.com/life.htm

Water What-ifs
A web site for encouraging inquiry investigations of water quality.
http://www.ncsu.edu/sciencejunction/depot/experiments/water/index.html

The Enforcers
An advance lesson pn predator and prey relationships.
http://insected.arizona.edu/enforcers/overview.html

3. The preparation of a digital field guide for organisms that inhabited the pond ecosystem. Each student was required to prepare a minimum of ten field guide pages using digital photographs taken during a short class excursion to a small nearby lake.

Using Digital Photographs to Create a Field Guide for the Pond

The third key learning activity for the Probing Ponds ecology unit was the creation of a digital field guide for the organisms that inhabited the pond ecosystem. Field guides are useful tools that scientists and nature enthusiasts employ to identify or classify organisms according to their distinguishing characteristic physical features. Additional information is typically given about the organism's regional range of habitation.
 

The following list can be used to assign students a pond organism or have them choose.

Objectives