Mystery Seeds Project
Grade: 4th Grade
Objective:
For students to collaborate with peers within in their own class and with students from other regions in order to solve what types of plants grow best in specific regions. Students will also learn how to collect and compare data using multiple math and science skills including making graphs, records, measuring, calculating area and percentages.
Summary:
Students will be broken up into four small groups (five depending on the size of the class). Each group will be given a package of seeds. The seeds will be from plants that are native to four specific regions across the US (not our region). Students will plant the seeds. They will be given specific instructions about the needs of these plants (type of soil, amount of light, temp., and amount of water needed) and will have materials provided to create and sustain the needed conditions. As the seeds grow, students will make observations about amount of growth over time, how many plants resulted from the seeds (another math skill-percentages), characteristics of each plant (comparisons of individual plants within a species to determine “typical” characteristics as well as species defining characteristics such as leaf shape, number of leafs per stem, height of stem, coloring, flower/veggie produced, etc.), and environmental conditions (they will keep records of air temperature, hours of sunlight exposure, amount of water, ph of soil?). Once the plants have grown to maturity (6-8 weeks), students will do some research to identify the plants. The mystery will be in identifying where the plant originated. The students will match the plant to the school it came from: Leeds Elementary School in Leeds, AL; Aikahi Elementary School in Kailua, HI; Aggie Roberts Elementary School in Henderson, NV; and Alice Fong Yu Alternative School in San Francisco, CA (even if we have to buy the seeds). Students will also research the regional conditions of the other locations. They can study weather maps (temp, precipitation), topographical maps, and regional gardening maps for each region. We could also use the farmer's almanac, online or print version, to look at weather patterns to help us determine where our seeds might be from. Another way to record our data would be to set up a still digital camera and have students take two digital pictures of the garden area each day. If we mounted the camera in a fixed position, we could then pull all the photos together with a time lapse effect of our growing season (without the expense of using a real time lapse camera.) After the plants mature and are identified, they can try to figure out which school sent what seeds based on the information they gathered. When they have them right, they can send thank you notes to those students.
When would your students contact these other students (at what point in their project work)?
Students could contact the other students from the four schools listed above before the project to share their own gardening experiences and confirm that the seeds they chose to send were received and planted, during the project to share what they are learning about the plants they are growing and to report the results of their inquiries, and after the project to thank the other students and find out how the seeds they sent fared.We could then share our "time lapse" photos of the project to show students how the seeds grew. It would make a neat visual for the students.
What kinds of questions would they ask each other and what kinds of information would they share?
What types of things they considered when choosing plants for their own outdoor gardens?
What have been your greatest challenges and how did you overcome them?
What have been your greatest successes so far and what do you think contributed to these?
What is your favorite gardening activity?
Were our seeds able to grow in your garden or only under the conditions we listed they needed?
They would also share growth information perhaps on a weekly basis.
What do you do with the plants you grow in your garden?
How/where were our seeds planted? Is your garden outdoors/indoors?
They could share pictures of their garden setups. (Using out time lapse configuration would be a neat tool here.)
Does it rain a lot where you are? Do you have an irrigation system?
How do you measure the amount of water the plants receive?
It might also be fun to ask more about the social or cultural aspects of gardening -- such as, how many people in your neighborhood have a garden? Why? Is it for growing food, or for making their yards pretty?
Does your garden attract any animals or insects (aphids, butterflies, birds?)
What will they do with the information they get from the other students?
They can record information on a growth chart to compare with their own growth chart to see similarities and differences. In addition to the comparisons, they can try some of the strategies other students have used to overcome challenges and promote success. They can gain regional clues from how the other children chose plants for their gardens. They can formulate their own plans for how to use the plants using the ideas of the other students.
What are the garden requirements?
The gardens will consist of planters that will be 4' x 4' for 4 small groups and 5'x5' for 5 small groups that will be located both inside and outside. We can grow plants that are native to our region outdoors while we pursue the collaborative aspect of the project indoors (so the environment is more easily controlled). In using seeds from other regions, we could plant some indoors (using the conditions that are most like the native region) and some in our own gardens and make record of which ones cannot grow in our region. Students will use math skills to measure and determine the area of the planters as well as figure out how to divide the planters equitably among small groups for the project. They will also have less weed intrusion this way. [This idea also came from the Leeds project as Eagle Scouts in the area volunteered to build wooden planters for each classroom].
What types of plants/seeds are we interested in exploring? (vegetables, flowers, grains, herbs)
I am not sure that all of the plants have to be of the same type. In fact, I think it would be more interesting if they were of differing types but this would necessitate more resources for children to use in identifying them and make their task a little more challenging. If they were all the same type of plant (i.e. edible/vegetable), it may be easier for students to associate with a region.Using the mounted camera system, we would also be able to collect data on shadows in the garden, which could be used later to talk about the Earth's rotation on its axis and the changing of the seasons.
Prior knowledge/experience needed:
The 4th grade Social Studies GLCEs focus on learning about the United States. By the spring, students should have some idea about the other states that form the Union as well as have some background knowledge about some basic characteristics of each region (where they are located geographically and how that relates to our location, how the climate of different regions compares to ours).
Students need to do their own garden planting outside (with their teacher) before embarking on a collaborative effort so they have a better understanding of space, plants to choose and why, soil, etc. These could be done simultaneously though as I know time is limited. It is important that students gain an understanding of the region we live in and the plants that live here. Then they can do comparisons between our region and other regions. Doing their own garden first also helps work out some of the challenges students may face with gardening in general before they collaborate.
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