Topic-A plants structure.
In our topic today we are going to look at what a plant needs to grow and be healthy. We looked yesterday at the structure of the plant. We found that the leaves help absorb sunlight to turn into food and that the roots stick into the soil anchoring it to the ground. Finally, the roots and stem work together to suck the water round the plant. I thought it would be interesting to begin a cress growing experiment to see how important these things are to a plants growth.
We are going to attempt to grow cress in four different conditions.
1. With no water. (Do not use damp cotton wool and do not water.
2. With no soil. (Do not use any soil or soil alternative such as cotton wool. Just place seeds in a container with water)
3. With no light. Place the container in a closet or shoe box.
4. In ideal conditions.
We will let the cress grow for 3 weeks and see how they grew at the end. Today I would like you to complete the prediction sheet saved in the topic folder.
- Bronze. Tick which box you think is true for each one of the conditions.
- Silver. Draw a picture of the cress for how you think it will look at the end of three weeks. You may want to look up a picture of cress so you have an idea of how they grow normally.
- Gold. Make a prediction on which one will grow the best and give a full reason using because. I think that……because……
Maths creating Carrol diagrams.
For this activity I would like the learners to create their own Carroll Diagrams. Remember a Carroll diagram requires two rules/criteria that the data must fall into and these rules must be binary. A example could be food I like/ food I don't like combined with food on the shopping list/food not on the shopping list. You could also do plants with flowers/not flowers and plants bigger then me/not bigger than me.
https://www.topmarks.co.uk/Flash.aspx?f=carrollv7 Carroll game
- Bronze. Create a Carroll diagram with physical resources such as your toys. (toys with wheels/without wheels and toys that have movable parts/do not have movable parts
- Silver. Complete your own Carroll diagram using any criteria
- Gold. Use your diagram to spot a pattern in your results. Using the toy example for earlier you might be able to see that all toys that have wheels also have moveable parts.
English-Instruction writing.
Unfortunately we are missing instructions on how to grow the cress in the four conditions. A good set of instructions uses simple command sentences, is numbered in the right order and has a list of what we need to complete the experiment. Luckily we do have instructions for how to grow the cress in ideal conditions. (See below)
Growing cress in ideal conditions. (You could also watch this video for help https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1eIjzGqIaI)
Instructions for how to grow cress.
You will need:
- ·Some cotton wool.
a plastic container.
- ·Some cress seeds
- ·A warm sunny area indoors.
Instructions
1. Wet some cotton wool.
2. Put the cotton wool* into a recycled plastic container so the bottom is covered.
3. Sprinkle the seeds onto the cotton wool.
4. Make sure you place the container in a sunny area like a window sill.
5. Gently dampen the cotton wool every couple of days.
*(Just as a note the damp cotton wool or paper towels act as the soil. You can use soil but apparently the cress does not taste as nice due to nitrates absorbed and it is messier.)
- Bronze. I would like you to rewrite the cress experiment needs. There has been some mistakes made including missing full stops, bullet points and capital letters. Please correct these mistakes.
- Silver. I have provided the instructions for how to grow the cress in ideal conditions. How would the instructions change if you where to write this for the other pots of cress such as the one with no soil? I would like you to spot which numbered steps would change for each one. You could do this verbally.
- Gold. I would like you to rewrite the set of instructions for one of the other cress conditions such as no soil. Remember to include what you would need and to use simple numbered sentences.